RTW to no-where in particular

[jastel]

Here is one thing you won't see anymore...the Azure Window collapsed in 2017.

 

[Antoallison]

Good photos.
Looks sunny in Malta with clear blue skies...
what are the temperature or winds like this time of year ?

 

[RooFlyer]

Good photos.
Looks sunny in Malta with clear blue skies...
what are the temperature or winds like this time of year ?

I was lucky. That day about 16 and not much wind. Shirt and jumper. The next day ( coming up) was low teens, cold wind and some rain sprinkles, Jumper and rain jacket. Just the end of winter, so weather a bit unpredictable.

 

[ric_melb]

I have finally caught up with most recent posts on this thread. It's great for RooFlyer to take the time to produce such a comprehensive report. Really enjoyed the photos and commentary about New York.
Thanks and safe travels.

 

[RooFlyer]

Next day, I booked a 'hop-on, hop-off' bus tour. First time on one of these, but it was the best way to see some of the sights out of Valletta central, in particular a couple of country sites.

A walk to the first pick-up point, past the new parliament house again. That's the new city gate on the left.



Walking down those steps - well, blow me down. A fine collection of straight cephalopods (fossils of them, anyway). Think squids and octopi, but with shells that are straight, not spiraled.



Ahem. Meeting the bus at the Statue of Independence outside the city gate. All sorts of busses terminate and pick up here, as they can't go into the narrow streets of the town.



From the top of the bus. Its quite a cold and blustery day; not great for sightseeing.



First stop Vittoriosa, the other side of the harbour, with Fort St Angelo at its tip.




Lots of buildings getting remodelled and new ones getting built - here the old and the new:



Wonderful collection of very narrow, ancient streets, and a large marina of the good stuff. Here's Plan B:

 

[RooFlyer]

More of the town.





The "Norman House' - built in the 12th century.



St Lawrence's church. The first version was built in the 15th century and the first church of the Order of St John. This one built in the 17th century. A fine old church, with chapels holding many saint's relics.











An hour after being dropped off (at any stop), the next bus comes along, and we are soon in the countryside. The Maltese wine industry used to use grapes from Italy. It still does, but they can now source local grapes as well.



The sea-side town of Marsaxlokk comes into view.

 

[RooFlyer]

I'd read up on this, so I knew what to expect. Its a glorious small fishing village - on a fine day it would be magnificent, but this was overcast and cold.

The large number of small and colourful fishing boats tied up in the bay are terrific.









Really quaint stuff. It was lunch-time, so I had a nice seafood lunch at a seaside cafe.

Fish soup, folowed by squid rings and mussels and some other local fish.





Very nice and very filling; about 12 euros, from memory.

 

[RooFlyer]

But now ... time to come clean. This idyllic fishing village is now pinned on each side by some very visually obtrusive industrial development. You can tune it out, but a shock when you see it.

One one side, a power plant (not shown) and LNG import dock:



On the other side a massive container dock. Malta acts like a freight hub in the Mediterranean (if you think of where it is) - so its not all import/export, but mainly trans-shipment.





My fishing village pics are just off to the left of this one:





The airport!!



Next stop should have been the Blue Grotto - a very popular place on the west coast. Would be great in fine weather, but it was very cold and blustery on the coast, so I stayed on board for the next stop, which I really wanted to see.

 

[RooFlyer]

Close to the Blue Grotto on the west coast are the Ħaġar Qim temples, one of three such sites on the main island of Malta. The other 2 are closer to Valletta, but the bus didn't stop there. Ggantija Temples of similar age are on Gozo, the second main island of Malta.

These megalithic, constructed 'temples' (no-one knows what they were really for, but religious worship is a good bet) date from 3,600-3,000 BC. This makes them some of the oldest religious structures on earth and up to 1,000 years older than the Egyptian pyramids. Stonehenge was 2,500-1,600 BC; Gobekli Tepe in Turkey is dated about 10,000 BC.

The site has been reconstructed only a little - mostly it is as excavated, initially in the 1830s/40s. Its had a protective shelter over it for the last 10 years or so.



Once you go in the 'main entrance, there are three or four discrete areas, or 'apses', some inter-connected.





Only a few of the stones have 'decoration':







The most impressive artifacts that have been found are a number of 'fat ladies' (the official term!), of which these are souvenir models:





The largest construction stone would have weighed about 20 tonnes.

 

[RooFlyer]

But wait, there's more 700m away is a second cluster, the Mnajdra temples. These are smaller and older - but still in the 4th millennium BC.



they are more formally structured, and one of the temples aligns with the sun in the solstices.












Back to Valletta, with drop-off on the waterfront.



This impressive lift allows cruise ship passengers (and weary solo explorers) an easy way up to the main town level:



... with some of the best views to the south-east (towards Vittoriosa etc)

 

[RooFlyer]

I was really pleased to have arrived just in time for the 4 pm gun, conducted every day by the Malta Historical Society.

You can watch from the level above, or for 3 euros you get a personal tour (but beware, that group watches from the gun level - its better observed from the upper level, I think)





Fort St Elmo from the viewing platform:



Boom!





Very satisfactory. This is just behind the viewing area - the Upper Barrakka Gardens.



Coupla shots in the evening as I looked for dinner.





Sigh. I just decided for a pizza from the 'Market' area around the corner from my hotel. It was a fabulous pizza!!

 

[OATEK]

Well done to capture the shot from the cannon.

 

[jastel]

Reminding me of some nice memories there...
Good to see a roof over those temples...Sliema seems to have progressed a lot too.

 

[RooFlyer]

Next morning, I got a brighter-than necessary start to the day when the taxi arrived early to take me to the airport for my flight to Brussels, via Munich, Plus on a Sunday morning, the trip was only abt 15 mins, rather than the 30 mins planned, so I arrived 3.5 hrs before departure. When I looked at this flight (outside of my DONE4 of course), the flight on LH via MUC was so much cheaper than the Air Malta flight direct that i though I must have gotten a mistake fare. It wasn't but good on you LH, you get the business!! In Business

The terminal was quiet ...

Then:



The 'Valletta' Lounge at MLA is bloody good. Spacious, light, reasonable food & bev and an outside terrace:









Boarded 15 mins early and left 10 mins early Only 3 in Business, but the rest of the A320 seemed pretty full. Bloody Euro-business, of course. Middle seats not even blocked off, just unoccupied (as was most of the cabin)

 

[RooFlyer]

Ryan Air certainly seems to have a lock on flights to MLA:



Hauling out of MLA:



The white thing is the cover to the ancient temples I visited yesterday. Malta is a small place!









A lunch of salad, cold cuts, cheese & desert. It was pretty nice. I've usually enjoyed LH's J catering. I was in Row 3 and the economy drinks cart stopped to serve me, while the J cart served Row 1. Riesling? No. OK, G&T then. The other cart, following DID have a Riesling, so I double-dipped. That was a bit odd.



Coast of Sicily:



And then Rome, or the outskirts:



Gah. Think of all those virus cases down there.

 

[RooFlyer]

Verdict on Malta. Must go back. There's so much more than Valletta, which was interesting enough, Gozo, the other big island is a must-do. Ten days to do Malta properly.

Then the Italian Alps came into view. I just love snow-covered mountains from the air):

















Out of the mountains ... into Germany.



... and approaching Munich

 

[RooFlyer]

I've transited MUC once before. It was years ago, and I don't remember the details, but I remember that for some reason I was tracking my bags and somehow I became aware that my bag wasn't taken off the plane. I can't remember how or why. At this time I was P1 equivalent in Air Canada'a FF scheme, so I had access to Senator Lounge, or maybe even above. The lounge Angels swung into top gear and by the time my transit was over, bag had been located and directed to where it was supposed to go. I recall the lounge was really nice - it was just at my departure gate. All was rosy.

That was then, this was now. No problems with bags, but I had to change terminals and post-codes from arrival gate to departure gate. The signs said 25 minutes and they were right. Fortunately the LH 'Business' lounge was next to my departure gate, so I occupied it.






I didn't find the free-pour beer that I remembered from before - maybe that's just Senator. Too soon, we were off again, MUC-BRU on LH, another A320.



This time it was cheese cake and, yes, a good Rhine Riesling.





Landed in Brussels - my first time in the country - and another airport marathon to get bags. This really gets tedious after a while.

Got bag, found train station in bottom level. Trouble getting ticket. I wanted Brussels-midi but that wasn't an option on the ticket machines, Helper said it was all Brussels. I got on board (fortunately avoiding buying 'first class' which i got tipped of was a rip-off), and off we went.



Most of the way, the signs said 'Brussels-zuid' (south) which followed Brussels Nord and Brussels central. I assumed 'midi' equated to 'central' but at some point the language changed and 'zuid' changed to 'Midi'. WTF? No English in this United Nations joint. I worked out the language differences later, but it wasn't a great start. No English on an airport train in Belgium? Life was much better when there were more pink bits on the map.

 

[RooFlyer]

I was booked at the Radisson Park - Midi, right next to the station. I was only transiting the night, going to Bruges the next day.

The room was described to me as 'the best in the house'.







Totally groovy, man. This place hasn't been remodeled since the '60s





It would do for a night. As usual, I was stuffed and just wanted something to eat in the hotel. No, the restaurant is closed, but you can get something from the bar. When they showed up, I ordered a pizza, which was a mistake. Frozen packet job and 'orrible.



The neighborhood was pretty ordinary, so no choice but to suck it up and put a line under Brussels.

 

[RooFlyer]

Check-out the next morning qualified for "one of my most bizarre travel moments".

Check-out lady tells me the charge, asks for my card in the machine and which currency?

"Can I look at a copy of the bill, please?"

"No, you can only get a copy when you have paid"

... I won't give a blow by blow but she didn't relent. She read out the 3 charges and while I looked at my booking sheet, she reached over and pressed OK on the card machine. I wasn't happy, and said so. It got a bit worse, but we didn't come to blows, but she did give me a 'send off' when we parted. The charges she read out sounded OK, but WTF? No copy of the bill until you pay??? There will be a sequel to this.

Radisson Park Hotel at Brussels Midi is a major AVOID.

Got the train to Bruges.

Waiting in the platform at Brussels the announcements were a bit confusing, but a very nice lady sorted them out for me and we ended up sitting together. She's been to Oz and in fact Tasmania several times, so it was a great trip until she alighted a few stops up. A great antidote to the hotel experience.

Seats on the train - note the newspaper headline ...





Apparently it had been raining for a week until today, which was the first break The countryside was flat and sodden.



Bruges has been designated a 'soft spot' on my RTW, meaning a bit of splashing out. Hotel booked is 'Hotel Orangerie' in the 'Small Luxury Hotels Of The World ' group.

I rocked up at the hotel at about 10:30am and the room of course wasn't ready (check-out was 11am) but the lovely check-in lady invited me to relax in the lounge, which I did, and I had a (deconstructed) hot chocolate - 5 euros and worth every penny. You swizzle the choc block in the hot milk.






Now, I have really good friends who don't travel much but they did a big trip for their honeymoon ~25 years ago. @JohnM and @juddles know who I am talking about. The guy has raved about the mussels at Bruges ever since that time. For all my travel, its the one thing he has over me - and rightly so! That's about to end.

 

[RooFlyer]

Bruges is the capital of West Flanders in Belgium, in the country's north-west. Its quite an expansive place, and has a port on the north sea, but I didn't intend to go further than the oval-shaped old medieval town. The train takes about an hour from Brussels; I'm told Ghent is worth a look too.



I mainly came to have a feed of mussels, so exploring the medieval town was a bonus. It was cold and windy and I hadn't done any research. I'll just follow my nose. Well, stepping out into the street, it was obvious where my nose would lead. That's a bloody tall bell tower. I wonder if you can climb up it?



I discovered a big town square - the Markt seemed like the center of town.





At one end the belfry tower looms over the square. It was built in the 12th century and although burned and restored a couple of times, the brick structure is essentially original.









Yes, 366 steps up to the observation platform. There is a full bell carillon up there. The day was still cold, so there was no queue. One of these days these bloody medieval staircases will be the death of me: