96 Hours in Malta

For someone who loves travel, this is actually my first ‘proper’ holiday, some may define it as a break with it only being 4 days, but I’ll take what I can get!

In a nutshell Malta was lovely and I would recommend it. So if you’re planning on spending some time over there, here’s some information about the area we stayed in and an example of what you can do within 96 hours in Malta.

Flights / Accommodation

We booked with Jet2.com allowing us to pay a deposit and then pay the remaining balance with instalments. They run flights to Malta at the moment from Manchester every Monday and Thursday. You can choose a flight only option, but we opted for a city break including transfers and hotel. We stayed at the Radisson Blu in St Julians (the hotel is nearer to Paceville), which was fabulous. Google maps said it was about a 25 minute walk into the Centre, but it wasn’t it was 10-15 minutes. The breakfast catered for all tastes / cuisines it was so weird to see Salad at a breakfast buffet, but it was there! They had the nicest breakfast muffins as well!

 

    
 

 

 

 

Travelling Around

We’d taken the transport provided by Jet2 to the hotel, but after this we used the public transport if we went out of the area. Bus tickets are 1.50 euros for 2 hours, so ideally you could catch 6 busses in that 2 hours and it’d only have cost you the 1.50. Busses do get quite cramped, and they just pile more and more people on.
Malta had very, very broken roads and we must have nearly crashed about 10 times! But the transport is frequent and good value.

Language
The official language for Malta is Maltese, but everyone we spoke to understood English. You obviously can’t walk up and start going ‘nah then thee arrs it guin’” but there was never a language barrier.

Eating Out

There’s plenty of places to eat around St Julians, the hotel we stayed in had 3 places that offer food.

As you walk into town there’s a row of restaurants near the Corintha hotel, which include Italian and Chinese cuisines – they are a bit pricey though.

There are also some street food kiosks, which are decent value for money. Chris had 2 pizza slices from UPA’s which cost about 2.80 EUR and he was full on those. They also have a serve-yourself Gelato stall, which is 2.30 EUR per 100g, the owner of the Gelato shop was so lovely!

We ate at the Hard Rock Café, prices were roughly what you’d pay in Nandos/Frankie and Bennys, we left feeling full so was good value for the money. I’d say you definitely need to try the hot fudge brownie that was to die for! And the Mango Tango Mocktail, finally a mocktail I can drink! They also have the Hard Rock Café shop to buy HRC memorabilia. I purchased the drinking glass, but they also have the T-Shirts etc.

 

 

Shops

There’s a number of British stores out there – I was really surprised to see W H Smiths, Mark and Spencers Foodhall and Holland and Barrett. In Gozo they even had a George store (Asda’s clothing) and an F&F store (Tesco’s clothing) I also saw a Matalan but can’t remember where!

 

Activities  

We headed out to Mediterraneo Marine Park,  You can walk there just under an hour or get the bus. We opted to walk there and get the bus back. They offer different ticket packages, you can have an interaction with the Dolphins, Sealions or Parrots for 60 EUR, or you get the option for the interaction with all 3 for 90 EUR or theres the swimming with Dolphins for 120 EUR. Each ticket includes entrance to the park, access to the shows and your chosen activity(ies) You can get standard entrance to the park which includes show access too plus you get the opportunity at the end of each show to have your photo with them. We did the Dolphin interaction which was great! I TOUCHED A DOLPHIN!!!!

You can also book a photo for 20 EUR before the interaction takes place, we did this due to fact it was our first holiday abroad together, but if I returned I’d go and get the one at 7 EUR if I liked it obviously. They do take a few photos so you can choose which one you like best.

Whilst in Malta we took a trip to Valetta, I had really gone to see the fountains I’d heard so much about, when we turned up they were completing building work so it had been fenced off. Looks like it’s going to be really nice around there. We then walked around the towns side streets to get the ferry across to Sliema. (Whilst waiting Chris ended up making friends with a local cat (there are a lot of street cats around Malta – On one occasion I swear a group of them had been holding a meeting, they all turned and watched me and Chris walk by on the way past. Think it was the Cat Mafia!) )

We took the bus to Cirkewwa Ferry Port and took the Ferry over to Gozo, where we took the Hop on Hop Off Bus tour, for the day. I’d recommend you get off at stop 6 (Dwejra Bay) this is where the Azure Window once stood, granted it’d have been lovely to see it, but it’s still beautiful. They have the inland sea, where you can take a boat trip into the caves. Over on the main site, people were rock-pooling, diving and fishing. Definitely worth a stop.

There were a number of other things on offer, but we didn’t have time to do them, they’ve got the Popeye village where the Popeye movie was filmed, there’s also a Game of Thrones tour for all you GOT fans. You can even get a boat trip through to Sicily.

 

Stay safe

We were endlessly warned about pick-pockets in Malta, so just make sure you keep all valuables safe.
The main beaches are rocky, which get very slippy so be careful when walking down to the sea.

There are companies offering trips to Comino and Gozo for a full day but I’d read really negative reviews for the company offering the best deal. People were saying they were felt rushed, made to feel like animals and not cared for. I really wanted to visit both places, but was told ideally you need a full day in both places. Searching for other options
But honestly, I’ve never felt so safe, in a long time!

I hope this helps if you’re thinking of going to Malta!
Feel free to drop me a line if you want to know anything else and I’ll try to help!

Until next time,

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