Sliema; Friday, 22 January, 2016

The original weather forecast for Friday was not good with a near 70% chance of rain. However, when I pulled back the curtains to reveal a crystal clear blue sky I thought it was likely I could get away with a day on an open-top bus without getting wet.

Breakfast completed and voucher exchanged for a ticket for the South tour I hopped on the first bus of the morning and headed out into the Southern part of the Island. After leaving Sliema the tour headed over to Valletta and did a full circuit around it’s fortifications before heading in land to Paola for yet more ancient temples and the Hypogeum. From Paola the bus headed over to the Three Cities, the original settlement of the Knights of St John when they settled the Maltese Islands, before they had finished fortifying Valletta.

From there the bus headed out into the more rural areas of the South East of the island, visiting the beautiful Maraxlokk harbour before heading back inland past ancient caves (making a note of which buses stopped outside the entrance ready for tomorrow) and under the Airport before heading to the Blue Grotto and the stunning ancient remains at Hagar Qim. From there it was back across the interior of the island, returning back to Sliema.

The bus dropped me off just in time to pick up one of the harbour tours which I duly did, taking in the views of the two harbours that surround Valletta and help make this one of the most important, and largest, natural harbour in the Mediterranean.

From the boat tour of the harbour it was back onto the open-top bus to go round again with the views from the opposite site, making sure I’d got the details correct for places to visit tomorrow, including where the relevant bus stops were and which buses to catch.

By the time the bus was starting on the final leg back into Sliema it hit really bad traffic and in the end we got an extended tour round some parts of the island that aren’t on the normal route so that the driver could pick up the coast road at Spinola Bay and head back into Sliema from the opposite direction. It also meant I was able to get a good view of the restaurants available at Spinola Bay which helped me decide where to go for dinner.

Back in Sliema I headed over to the hotel to freshen up and drop stuff off before heading over to the bus stop and picking up a bus back round to Spinola Bay where I found a very nice restaurant on the edge of the bay overlooking fishing craft and the water. I had a very pleasant dinner, with a particularly nice half bottle of Maltese wine, before heading back to Sliema exhausted and ready for my bed.