We ventured north today to the St. Paul’s Bay area and Mellieha. These two locales are where there are lots of tourists and holiday apartments and summer homes for the Maltese. Christine remembers going with her family to Mellieha Beach as a child. And we went with Eve to Mellieha Beach for a day back in 1985. So,we wanted to revisit these areas.
We ventured out on the #222 bus. This was also a dry run for getting to the Gozo ferry in Cirkewwa for when we decide to go to Gozo. The Maltese Islands are an archipelago comprised of Malta, the largest, Gozo, the second largest, Comino, smallest and inhabited by only a handful of people, and some 9 other “islands” which mostly amount to big rocks sticking up out of the sea, but not inhabited, like Filfla near the Blue Grotto. Comino is very popular in the summer for its Blue Lagoon, a crystal clear bay that attracts bathers and boaters. Gozo is kind of its own world where the Gozitans are “old Maltese” who prefer a slower lifestyle. Gozitans also have there own version of the Maltese language.
The bus ride provided stunning views of the Mediterranean all along the northeastern coast. The highway is new along the coast and in most places the road is right at seaside. Today was a very windy day with average wind speed of 30 mph, so the navy blue Mediterranean was filled with glowing whitecaps and the surf was crashing along the rocks. Really spectacular scenery. The only downside to being on the bus is I can’t tell the driver to stop so I can take pictures of all the beautiful scenery.
I had picked a bus stop in the St. Paul’s Bay area, not really knowing what would be around it. We disembarked right at some salt pans. These were industrial size salt pans, not in use any longer, but are in the process of being turned in to a salt harvesting information center. The project isn’t quite finished yet, but we walked around the entire circumference of the salt pans and enjoyed some spectacular views both of the pans and of the bay.
These salt pans are shallow artificial ponds designed to extract salts from seawater. The seawater is fed into large ponds separated by levees, and water is drawn out through natural evaporation which allows the salt to be subsequently harvested. The ponds also provide a productive resting and feeding ground for many species of waterbirds, and in fact, the Malta bird park was right across the highway. While we were walking around the pans, a woman with binoculars was checking out the species of birds in the pans. Close by, there was a protected area for waterbirds, as well. The nearby town of Salina grew up around the salt production industry, but now is no longer thriving due to the closure of the salt harvesting plant. However, the project signage indicated that they hope to return to some production of “high end salt,” whatever that is.
After walking around the salt pans we stumbled upon the Salini National Park. This was a green space adjacent to the salt pans. We got into the park by climbing around a chained gate because we didn’t want to be bothered to walk around to find the official entrance. The park was lovely and had a beautiful playground for kids and an exercise trail, with exercise equipment, for adults. It had lots of greenery and was just a very pleasant area. Parts of it having scrub pines made us think of Cape Cod.
As we were wandering around the park we noticed a small monument. I walked up the stairs to see what it was about and was quite surprised to find a JFK memorial. I don’t really know what the connection is with JFK and this park, but there it was.
We really enjoyed our walk through the park. I read later that the park was created as compensation to the communities nearby for the disruption caused by the building of the new highway, and, that over 100,000 trees had been planted in the park. I wonder what the city of Binghamton has planned in the way of compensation for the disruption caused by the Riverside Drive project over the past two years?? Or NYS for the disruption ongoing around Kamikaze curve.
We were walking all uphill in the park and found our way out into a jungle of apartment high rises. There is massive building going on with giant cranes everywhere. Malta is the most densely populated place in the world and with all the increased burden of tourism, housing is at a premium, especially in areas people like to holiday. All along St. Paul’s Bay on both sides are huge developments. The municipalities are organized rather like New York State with towns and villages within a large area controlled by local councils, like our counties. So, in St. Paul’s Bay there are towns with names like Qawara, Buggiba, Xemxija, which we have yet to get the hang of pronouncing. “Q” is apparently an “h” sound, while “x” is a “sh” sound. We walked through parts of each of these towns.
We eventually made it to the edge of the actual bay and found a nice little restaurant where we had a much needed sit-down and a cappuccino. By now, we had already walked about 3-4 miles and it was only just past 11:00. But we were enjoying ourselves and were loving exploring with no real set plan or destination.
The St. Paul’s Bay area is really beautiful, and aside from the wind knocking us around, it was lovely being there.
St. Paul’s Bay is so named because it is the location where St. Paul was shipwrecked. The actual spot of his landing after the shipwreck is proclaimed to be on a little island out in the bay, St. Paul’s Island. There is a statue of St. Paul on the island. The shipwreck story of Paul and his landing on Malta is found in the Acts of the Apostles.
After walking around a good part of St. Paul’s Bay, we then started heading towards Mellieha and picked a street where there would be a bus stop, thank goodness. And, here came a bus, so we hopped on and rode the rest of the way to Mellieha. We didn’t know exactly where we wanted to get off so we just winged it. We had wanted to be near the beach, but we learned that the town of Mellieha is all up and down, mostly down, a long way down! We unknowingly got off only mid-way down, but I was pleased to see that we were at Sanctuary of Our Lady of Mellieha Church. I had seen this place in a travel video. This is Malta’s national shrine. There is another shrine in Gozo that we’ll also probably visit. But Our Lady of Mellieha is a huge structure and it sits high atop a rock ledge. Much of the original church was in caves in the rock. And there are WWII bunkers that sheltered the Maltese in these caves during the war. The parish church of Our Lady has been expanded several times to keep up with the population growth in Mellieha. Pope John Paul II came to bless the shrine in 1990. There is an exhibit of this within a dug out rock cavern, which was pretty interesting. A traditional notion held by the church is that there is a painting in the chapel done by St. Luke when he was in Malta with St. Paul. The painting is being restored and was covered when we visited. Soon, however, there is going to be a big celebration for its restoration unveiling. I’m sure there will be a big to-do about that.
From the terrace of the church one gets a fantastic view of Mellieha Bay.
We walked further uphill around the back of the church to where we had another striking view, and wow was the wind whipping!
We walked back to the bus stop and rode the bus down to the beach. We certainly would not have made it walking down the windy, twisty road to the beach.
There seems to be much less development going on around Mellieha Beach itself. Up the hill in the town is another story. However, I think one of the saving graces around the beach area is the presence of a nature preserve. So hopefully, Mellieha will stay less commercialized.
I was fascinated by the red tower on the ridge up above the beach. That last swatch of land before the Gozo channel is called the Marfa ridge. The Knights built that large tower, called St. Agatha’s Tower, or the Red Tower, in 1649. Like the Wignacourt Tower in St. Paul’s, this was a garrison and housed 30 men and had canons and other armament. During that period there was a lot of pirate activity going on, and in addition to a defensive tower, this was a lookout for pirates. The Knights did quite a bit of corsairing themselves to fund a lot of their lifestyle, so they kept watch for other pirate ships and then plundered them. We didn’t get up to the Red Tower this trip, but we might some other time.
We found a bayside restaurant where we collapsed into our seats. We thought our hike today gave us permission to order burgers and they were yummy. I think this was the first red meat we’ve had nearly the entire time we’ve been away from home. After lunch, we stood and drank in beautiful Mellieha Bay. This is a real family-oriented beach, one of the few sandy beaches in Malta. The water is shallow here so that kids can romp without fear of getting knocked over by waves or getting in over their heads.
Just then, a bus came along, the #222 back to Sliema. Perfect timing, as I don’t think we could have walked any longer. All told, I’d say we walked probably 6-7 miles or so, a lot of it uphill. Part of our bus trip home was rather frightening. As I said, Mellieha, the town, is on top of a big hill and heading to St. Paul’s Bay goes down this very winding road with switchbacks. Our bus driver was a bit of a speed demon, but then two old guys got on the bus in Mellieha and sat in the first row on the opposite side behind the driver. As we were racing down this curvy road, the driver would turn around and talk to these guys. Scared the heck out of us. Christine said that’s how I made her feel during our Utah trip when we were coming down these switchbacks and I’d point something out to her. But, we made it home safely, thank God.
We had a really lovely day just wandering around and taking in this beautiful island.