Just a quick bit of history from my earlier lesson! Before
the Middle Ages it seems that the three Maltese Islands (Malta, Gozo and
Camino) were governed for about 100 years by the Arabs from nearby North Africa
who terraced the land and introduced cotton, citrus fruits and Arabic
cuisine. Europeans came next – French,
Italian, British. After both 20th century world wars the whole
nation awarded the George Cross for bravery, because the island was constantly under fire.
There’s evidence of every influence still, language, culture, cuisine. English is still one of the
official languages, Maltese is the other official language that is spoken, and
quite a lot of Italian. Some words used are Arabic too.
Sailing in it looked as though we were visiting the ruins of
Rome or Greece, but the ruins had been restored and kept perfectly clean ever
since. It was quite breath-taking. I have
taken many photos and some are already on Facebook.
We had decided to take it fairly easy after yesterday’s
effort, so after breakfast we walked to the Barrakka Lift up the cliffs to the town centre of
Valetta. This lift is amazing as it cuts
all effort out of getting from port to town.
It carries up to 800 people per hour for 1 euro “return”. From there we took a lot more photos of the
buildings in the Upper Barrakka Gardens and ruins under restoration and
continued walking towards the centre where we found buskers, an open air yoga
session, art galleries and art materials, every shop and store you can think of
and many cafes and restaurants.
We have had beautiful sunny, cloudless skies today too and a
temperature of 22C, which has been very agreeable. After our visit to Valetta we enjoyed being in
the sun back on the ship, resting and stretching while we bobbed about in the
hot tub, then into the sauna, which is also becoming pleasant again now the outside
temperature has dropped. Sail away was just before dinner, and we managed
to get pictures from our balcony of the side of the ship we’d missed when sailing
in, like the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
Then it was time for dinner, reminding me that there are only
5 more of these decadent 5-coursers to go.
Thereafter my stomach will not understand what’s going on, but will have
to get over itself!
Tonight we were intrigued to find out more about the Saxophone
band, Saxation, made up of four really accomplished musicians, all women who
have appeared in the West End or toured solo.
They were in the Palladium tonight and their music was excellent. The only thing I didn’t like was the “choreography”
– I wished they’d just played, but maybe they had been advised to do something
different, and so they had. They performed things like Baker Street, Bohemian
Rhapsody, Lord of the Dance, Pink Panther theme, Flight of the Bumble Bee, a Stevie
Wonder Medley, the Storm, something from the Lion King and some I can’t
remember, but a great variety, on all
types of sax and also flute, some solo, some in pairs, three or all
four. They are coming back in a couple of days too.
We are off on two sea days now, passing through the Straits
of Gibralta on Sunday, and Lisbon on Monday, then only two sea days to
Southampton. Bye for now. I will be back tomorrow, probably after art.
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