Valletta; Saturday, 17 March, 2007

After a filling breakfast I left the hotel and walked the couple of yards to the end of the road, which was also the coast. I walked along the coastline for about a kilometre, going the whole way around the head of land that Sliema, where I was staying, is built on.

I reached the ferry terminal, purchased a 7 day bus pass, and promptly made no use of it as I boarded the ferry to cross the harbour over to Valletta.

From the quay side at Valletta I had a wander up through the capital, stopping to go into the spectacular St John's Co-Cathedral and museum, and the Knights Armouries, before continuing on down to the other side of the spit of land that Valletta is built on, walked along the coast a little and stopped at the Malta Experience.

This is a 45 minute audio-visual presentation which tells the history of Malta, from the Neolithic, to it's independence from Britain in the 1960's and it's declaration of itself as a republic in the 70's.

From there I walked back through the city centre to the bus station and caught one of the "Vintage" busses which run Malta's public transport network out to Buskett Gardens. These are the only woods on the islands, and house a large park area open all the time. Sadly my arrival coincided with a 45 minute heavy shower, which meant that the only parts of the gardens that I saw were from various shelters. The rain eventually stopped, but by then I decided to move on.

A little further up the road is Clapham Junction, it’s named due to the number of "cart tracks" (though there is no evidence that it was carts that made them) that have been cut into the soft limestone. From there I walked back towards Buskett and on to Dingli where I caught the bus back into Valletta, just missing the next heavy downpour. By the time I arrived in Valletta it was already getting dark, so I had a quick wander around the centre before grabbing some dinner in a restaurant by the Cathedral.

After a particularly large dinner, only because no-one bothered to mention the size of the starters!, I waddled back to the bus station and caught the bus back to the hotel.