Destination: Malta

"You're going where?" "To Malta!" "...er, why Malta?" "Because... um... it's there?"

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This conversation happened a few times in the days and weeks leading up to the last-hurrah girls' trip to Malta. True, it's not one of the hottest destination spots in Europe, but it's also likely true that unless you're in Italy, you probably aren't going to make the trip to Malta so why the heck not? After all, there was a movie made about some falcon that lived there, and I think maybe some historic things happened there. I at least knew it existed because my geography teacher in 10th grade never let me forget that I left it off of my map of Europe.

Valerie and I had been trying to plan some sort of cool trip for quite a while. When a few others indicated interest, the list of possible destinations got all screwed up. "I've already been there..." "I have no interest in going there" "But are there beaches? I need beaches..."

Criteria were:
• No one had been
• Is affordable
• Not too hard to get to
• Within EU (critical for return to Italy for those who may have slightly overstayed their visa...)

Malta? Sure, why not? Bring it!

When Val found a package deal that included direct flight and 4 nights in a 5-star hotel for the US equivalent of $375, we figured we had nothing to lose. We booked it and shortly thereafter were joined by Kendra and My, then Christine and Nadia. How can you go wrong with a group of 6 hot women? You could have dropped us in Siberia and we'd make it fun. Unfortunately, our fabulous friend Christine was unable to make it at the last minute, so 6 became 5. But the show must go on.


Kendra, Valerie, Nadia, My and me

The journey began last Saturday morning. Because we were flying from Bologna, we hopped a van (thank you Val) to take us from Florence to the Bologna airport. A quick 1.5 hour flight later we landed on the tiny island of Malta.

For point of reference, Malta is a bit smaller than Martha's Vineyard. I only just learned that now, I knew nothing about it before we went there. And truth be told I know almost nothing about it now. I am slightly embarrassed to admit that but there... I said it. I was on vacation, dammit, not a school trip.

But I digress...

We took a couple of cabs from the airport where the most obvious difference is that they drive on the wrong side of the road. I mean OPPOSITE side of the road. This is a throwback to the time that Malta was a British colony, which also explains the bright red English phone booths that are scattered about.


Phone booth and modern day public transportation

To summarize the days that followed: cocktails, food, sleep, pool, food, cocktails, food, sleep. You may notice that the word "beach" is missing from the activity list. This was not for lack of trying. Well, maybe we didn't try that hard but we did ask a lot of people "where is the best beach?" Their first question was invariably "rocky or sandy?" What kind of question is that? Sandy, of course!!

The first respondent told us about a small, man-made sandy beach about a 10 minute walk from the hotel. Man-made? No, thank you.

The second respondent told us that there was a pretty good sandy beach about 20-25 minutes away by bus. Hm, possibly.

The third respondent was adamant that the best sandy beach by far was also reachable by bus but we'd have to be on it for 45 minutes.

Pool on the roof of the hotel? Unanimous agreement. We spent a lot of time up there. It was really nice, had bathrooms and people who would bring you drinks, and you didn't get sand in uncomfortable places. It was awesome.

But on the day before we left, we realized that with the exception of a couple of dinners in other nearby towns, we had not seen any of Malta. It was time to soak up some culture and learn a bit about its rich history. How? By taking one of those open-top tour buses, the perfect way to see any new place! We left the hotel to make our way down to the waterfront where we could jump on the bus, making a rather lengthy detour into a shoe store on the way. When we reached the bus stop, we learned that we had missed the last tour bus by 1/2 hour, exactly the duration of our shoe-shopping excursion. Darn it.

Our power negotiator Nadia managed to get us a private van "tour" of a couple of Malta's highlights and thank goodness we did this. We saw Dome in Mosta which is the 4th largest in Europe, and then we visited Mdina, the oldest city on the island (4000 years,) also known as "the silent city." It is incredibly beautiful and has an amazing atmosphere. Our driver Benny did not offer a huge amount of background on either of these places but the most important thing is that we saw more of Malta than just the pool at the hotel.


Inside of Mosta Dome and entrance to Mdina, "the silent city"

My overall impressions of Malta are as follows:
• Incredibly nice people
• Grittier than I expected and not as pretty
• Beige

This trip did accomplish what I was hoping for, though, which was to spend time with some great new friends, get a tan, relax, and eat some good food. We had fish every day, laughed harder than any of us probably have in a long time, and made memories that will last a lifetime. And that's what vacation is really all about.

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