Malta course: července 2013

7/31/2013

Day 8 - Rabat and Mdina

Rabat is a bigger neighbour of beautiful Mdina. There are only 250 permanent inhabitants living in Mdina, a town with old historic atmosphere and narrow lanes, which was constructed by the Arabs and the Knights of St. John to protect people inside high walls. The Grand Masters of the order built huge pallaces and houses there. There is a mixture of architetecture styles - such as baroque, rennaisance, neoclassic and others. There is the only cathedral of St. Peter and Paul is in Mdina. All other sacred places in Malta are only churches.
I also saw a wonderful church in Mosta with the third biggest free dome in the world. The biggest one is St. Peter's dome in Rome and the second one is St. Paul' s in London.

St.Paul' s church in Rabat

Mdina and Rabat are neighbours

Coaches for tourist who are lazy:)

A dome in Mosta - a view up

A squre in Rabat

Mdina at night

Narrow lanes in Mdina

Day 7 - Dingli Cliffs

Sunday was a day for our individual program. I spent the whole hot day walking along the highest cliffs here in Malta, which are situated on the south coast of Malta. The highest point reaches 250 metres above the sea level and I could see a big part of the island. The countryside is very dry in July and people can expect some rain in September. It usually doesn' t rain from June to September. There were fields with some dry plants and vegetables, eukalyptus trees, carob trees and after 2,5 hours walking along the coast I found a miracle. The steep path going down to the sea. It was the most beautiful place for swimming and snorkeling at all.

A view from the road down

Some vegetables trying to grow

Cliffs

A big special sort of a bumbble bee

A steep path going down to the sea

7/30/2013

A video about Malta and our course

This presentation shows you some pictures from Malta, some photos from the course and you can listen to Maltese language. The song is an old folk song.

Day 6 - Gozo Island

The whole day trip to Gozo island was quite exhausting but very very interesting. We visited the place with Azure Window - a marvelous and stunning work of nature, then we went to the capital Victoria (former Rabat) - it was named after the queen Victoria during her reign. Narrow streets in the real heart of an old town with Citadela were full of boiling air and we were almost burnt and fried there. A bottle of water is a necessary thing all the time. The last stop was in a beautiful swimming area with a rocky bank. We refreshed there a little.

Mgarr - the port in Gozo

the ferry

Cliffs with Azure window

Me and the cliffs

Tourists

Gozo' s coutryside

The capital Victoria

Narrow streets in Victoria

Swimming Bay

View from Gozo to Malta island

Day 5 - Speed boat trip to Comino

24 people went to George' s Bay to take a speed boat to a small island called Comino. This island is uninhabited and only during summer season there is a hotel for tourists. It is a place with the Blue Lagoon, an excellent place for swimming and snorkeling. The name of the island comes from the word cummin - the seasoning used while boiling potatoes. The island lies between Malta and Gozo. The boat was very fast, maximum speed was 50 km per hour.

The view back to St.Julian' s

We enjoying the trip

Another boat with more passengers

Blue lagoon with clear water and lots of people

Comino island is dry in summer without any trees

7/26/2013

Day 4 - The Blue Grotto and Marsaxlokk

Next trip led me to the south-east of the island to the cliffs with the Blue Grotto. The first view I had was from the vantage point beside the road. I wished to get closer so there was an opportunity to go down and to use a small boat to get to the cave. I didn´t do that because it was afternoon and the light inside makes beautiful reflections and produces also a kaleidoscope of colours on the walls of the cave only in the morning.
Then I went to Marsaxlokk - the home of Malta' s biggest fishing fleet. I saw there Phoenician - style fishing boats - painted with bright colours with characteristic eyes designed to protect the fisherman from bad luck.
On both sides of this picturesque village there were two huge factories - a power station and a container dock.

A vantage place for admiring

The Blue Grotto

Another view

Heidi from Germany and Murat from Turkey

Marsaxlokk

Fishing boats

Day 3 - Golden Bay, Mosta, Mgarr

Our lessons finished at 12:30 today and we had an opportunity to travel and to experience new places. I travelled by bus no. 225 to Mgarr - a village with 2,300 inhabitants which had an African look in the midday sun. An oval-domed parish church of Virgin Mary was built in 1889. Near the church there is a place called Ta´H agrat - a prehistoric temple dating back to 2,900 B.C.Then I continued to Golden Bay. It took about one hour to get there. There are three bays in this area. Golden Bay, Ghajn Tuffieha Bay and Gnejna Bay. The first one is the most commercial one with hotels and other facilities but the others are less populated, more beautiful and wilder. The Tower of the Knights of St. John offers an excellent view to all these bays.The last visit of this day was a church situated in Mosta, which was buil in 1860 . The cupola is one of the biggest in the world.