The oldest swinger in town
Scott-Free’s blog
Steve & Chris
Wed 4 Aug 2010 14:44
Wednesday 4th August
2010
We have been in
Malta now for a week and a half, having missed our weather window last Sunday
because our autopilot was still not fixed. We thought we might get away
tomorrow, but another look at the weather forecast says not. There are
some strong winds forecast, straight on the nose as usual, tomorrow and Friday,
so we'll be here until Saturday, when the winds will ease, though they will
still be on the nose. The autopilot was fixed on Monday,so the weather is
the only thing holding us up now.
That's really not a
problem for us because it's very nice here and we are enjoying our stay.
We are moored in Manoel Island Marina which is very pleasant, with views across
the creek to Valetta. We have been into Valetta several times on the bus -
the standard fare is 47cents - and it takes only 10 minutes from here.
There is also a ferry which runs from just along the promenade over to
Valetta. From the bus station there we can get a bus to anywhere on the
island.
We began our
sightseeing our first weekend when we shared a hire car with Rob & Sarah
(Serafina) and went for a tour around the island, map in hand. We found
some very nice bays, went to the Northern tip of the island and looked out at
Gozo, and found a very nice spot for coffee and cake which we then returned
to a few hours later for lunch! We had heard and seen fireworks going
off every night since we arrived and decided to visit one of the villages in the
evening to experience their celebrations for the Feast of Our Lady of the
Rosary (or some such thing!) The town was decorated and lit up, and
the streets were full of stalls. We found a spot to get a bite to eat, and
discovered we were right where the fireworks would be let off. Later
we moved to the town square where enormous catherine wheels had been set up, and
when they were let off we decided we were a little too
close!
The church by
day...
...and lit up like a fairy grotto at night.
At least we now had
some idea what was happening every evening when we heard the fireworks, and of
how the Maltese enjoy themselves!
Once the car went
back we set about doing lots of mundane jobs on the boat, stocked up in the
supermarket where we could get all sorts of British foodstuffs we haven't seen
in a while and in between used the buses to see a bit more of the
island.
One of the old
buses in Valetta bus
station.
The view of Valetta across the bay from the marina.
A Valetta street, decorated for St Dominic's
feast
We had seen adverts for a Rod Stewart concert when we
first arrived and had thought we would be gone before it took place.
However, as it turned out that we were still here, we got ourselves some tickets
and went along. The last time we had seen him live was in the early 70's
in Brixton, and it was interesting to see him now, aged 65, still singing the
same old songs. He also sang a few cover versions too, mainly Motown,
which was also interesting. It was an enjoyable couple of hours, though we both
agreed it lacked a bit of 'umph'.
Rod Stewart in
concert
The plan now is to
enjoy a couple more days here in Malta, and then to set off for Sidi bu Said in
Tunisia, hopefully Saturday morning. It's about 230 miles, so we'll be a couple
of days at sea and probably arrive on Monday. Fingers crossed the weather
settles down as per the forecast!