Right smack in the middle of the country, perched on its highest point, sit the old capital of Malta. The medieval walled city of Mdina, commonly called "the Silent City", it lies in wait for many-a-tourist to fill its winding alleyways with the noise of clicking cameras and chi-chinging cash registers.Situated well away from the sea, or as far away as you can in Malta, the conjoined cities of
Rabat and Mdina call out to tourists like same ancient stone siren. Mdina, dating back some 1,300 years, is the one time capital of the island. Understandably it has had many face lifts since. Although the majority of buildings are private homes to the 700 inhabitants, the town manages to scrap up a couple of tourist pleasers too. Namely the central cathedral, the conversion of St. Paul (everything on the island is named after Paul). Placed in a large square it is impossible to miss. All the narrow, meandering alleyways seem to make their way there. With a few "palaces" and makeshift museums, there's enough in the walled bastion to occupy an hour or so. And the views over the island are wonderful. But it really isn't the individual attractions that are endearing about the place. But it has a certain "je-ne-sais-pas" that is seriously lacking in the new capital of Valletta. But seeing as the city can only hold so many, it was natural for it's brethren Rabat to serve a role.Nothing to be sneezed at itself, Rabat does it's best to impress travellers with a cavalcade
of its own attractions. Shockingly, it has a church (oh god not another church) named after, you guess it, St Paul. But unlike other parts of the island, Rabat has a couple of catacombs to check out. However, the catacombs of St. Paul is a bit of a misnomer as they're not the place the Saint is buried, but instead where he hung out for a couple of months while shipwrecked on the island. There are also a couple of semi and fully pedestrianized streets that are pretty enough to wander around. I kinda liked relaxing in the bar that is directly opposite the church. But I'm a bit naughty like that!If bored/overloaded with churches (as one gets in Malta) you could always check out the nearby
Dingli Cliffs. While not the most dramatic, they are one of the most accessible by public transport. Although i opted to walk from there into Rabat. It's not to say that I was personally bored with the area, it's all rather pleasant and nice and stuff. However, there are better examples of any of the individual attraction on offer in this area on other parts of the world. And i suppose once you've seen the biggest or the tallest or the whatever-est Malta, including Rabat and Mdina, failed to impress.
3 comments:
Malta is one of the best islands to live... Very law crime, cheap, fun, friendly people, ISLAND ANYWAY :)
Just a quick note - first of all, I enjoyed reading your post. I would just like to give you a piece of advice :)
I am a Maltese myself, and the more posts I read from you about Malta, the more I realised you were approaching the country from the wrong angle. It is no surprise that the country is small, and hence any attraction is also small and as you said, lacking a 'wow' factor huge cities like London or New York have. (you compared Malta to the rest of the world instead of trying to see it as an individual country). But Malta is not about its attractions and wondering around alone. It's about making international friends, then spending a day at the beach or exploring the fantastic restaurants (you need a bit of research done before as a lot of them are terrible). It's about experiencing the island, rather than looking at things. It's about the festivals and the events and being in the right place, at the right time. AndI agree with you, the temples are terribly boring and simply have a historical value for the world. Anyway, you should go in summer, get yourself in a group of mixed nationalities and 'live' Malta. Then it's boredom suddenly turns into magic.
Thanks-you for the suggestion. But my entire stay in Malta i stayed in local peoples homes. Most of the tourists i met (it is the off season) were twice my age. I'm sure that the summer is much more lively, but i've never been much of a beach guy. Too pale :)
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