Today we took a long, but not strenuous, walk around the end of the bay along the sea wall on the other side to San Pawl il-Bahar, the Maltese version of St. Paul’s Bay. In this case, I mean the town of St. Paul’s Bay, not the bay itself. St. Paul’s Bay is the largest town in the northern part of Malta. Since 1993 Malta has been divided into 68 localities governed by local councils. There is no administrative level between the local councils and the national government. Malta is such a tiny island that 68 local councils seems like a lot. The Executive Branch of the government is comprised of the Cabinet and the Parliamentary Secretaries. The legislative branch is unicameral consisting of a House of Representatives. There are 2 major political parties, Labour and Nationalist. There is also a Democratic Party, but it is very small in terms of representation. Currently, the Labour Party is in control of the House and so the Prime Minister is the leader of the Labour Party, Joseph Muscat. The House appoints a President for a 5-year term. The current President is a woman. The President appoints the Prime Minister seems a little ripe for deal-making). From reading the Times of Malta on a regular basis, I can tell you that there is as much corruption and political shenanigans here in Malta as there is in the U.S.
The town of St. Paul’s Bay has about 21,000 full time residents, but in the summer the population zooms up to over 60,000. The bay area is considered “the” place to have a summer flat if you are Maltese, or where tourists come for their holiday. One area contiguous to St. Paul’s Bay is Qawra and it is a high rise jungle full of holiday flats. The amount of building going on in Malta is quite distressing and there are fights between local councils and the national Planning Authority. Supposedly there is a national plan for development, but it seems pretty willy-nilly to me. Malta is one of the most congested places on earth and the building here is encroaching on what little farmland is left. What breaks my heart is the destruction of all the old, beautiful, yellow limestone buildings with the Maltese balconies to be replaced by concrete high rises.
Another major problem in Malta is traffic. With a population of about 450,000, Malta has about 386,000 cars and motorcycles. I read that 46 new vehicles per day are registered in Malta. It’s an awful problem. And even with that, the buses are packed. The noise and pollution from vehicles is a huge problem, especially motorcycle noise.
At any rate, we walked down the Xemxija hill, around the end of the bay, and along the seawall opposite our flat. It was a nice day, not too hot, and we really liked being close to the water. What we really liked was looking back across the bay to see, first, where our flat is, and then to have a long view of the area we walked on Sunday.
At a small little marina at the Vecca jetty, a mystery was solved for me. Sitting on our terrace in the evening I kept hearing what I thought was quacking ducks. I really didn’t think that was right, but I could swear I was hearing ducks. And, I was, because there were ducks at the Vecca jetty. At night, I think their quacking carried across the water to my ears.
At the Vecca jetty we had to go back up to city streets and walk along Triq San Pawl until we could return to the promenade that rings around the bay in San Pawl. We really never tire of looking at the sea so strolling, then bench sitting, on the promenade was a perfect thing to do.
We continued our walk along the promenade until we decided it was time for lunch. After checking out a small waterfront cafe that didn’t have a vacant table in the shade, we continued on until we found Gillieru, a waterfront restaurant. What is interesting about this place is that in 2016 we stopped in there for a cappuccino in 2016. The place had had a major renovation so it didn’t look the same until we entered and saw the big, long bar across the entry room. We both remembered that. We were seated out on a covered terrace with a wonderful view across the bay. We had a great lunch. We’ve been eating our bigger meal at lunchtime so that we can just have a light snack in the evening. We both had fantastic pasta dishes, mine with mixed seafood and Christine’s with lobster and shrimp. It was really good.
After lunch we continued our way along the seafront to where we rented our kayaks in 2016. This being off-season, there was no sign of the guy renting kayaks. One little nicety was we found a Body Shop right across the street where Christine was able to replenish her coconut body cream, which she was very happy about.
We wandered our way through the streets looking for a bus stop and found one where any number of buses were going in our direction. After a few minutes wait, and a few minutes ride, we were back at our Roti stop where we got off the bus. We stopped in the Xemxija Cafe to buy some cannolis. I saw some in the bakery case the other day. Christine has been kind of craving a cannoli since Italy and we haven’t seen any. We carried our cannolis home in a lovely box.
When we got back to the flat Christine had an urge to go swimming. We had scoped out a place earlier this morning where we could get into the bay, so we changed into our bathing suits and walked back down the hill. We went down some steps below the street level and walked along a pathway to the “beach” area. It kind of reminded me of walking along our rocks in Sliema. I wasn’t too thrilled at the idea of swimming, but I must confess that, while a bit cold, the water was nice. Christine swam for quite a while and was very happy. I sat on a little jetty while she finished her swim. It really was a nice thing to have done.
Back at the flat we cleaned up and had a light dinner. We then enjoyed our cannolis sitting out on the terrace.
In the distance, we watched lightening make the clouds glow. Fortunately, that storm didn’t come our way. During the night before, we did have quite a thunderstorm with lots of lightening and a very heavy downpour.
Once again though, the weather was in our favor for a nice outing today and we thoroughly enjoyed our ramble into San Pawl il-Bahar.
L&C Even tho I have not been commenting, I have been reading your blog everyday. I am still so very happy for you!!! SOunds like the trip of a lifetime. Eve
Hi Eve. I’m so pleased you are reading the blog. And yes, it has been the trip of a lifetime. We feel very blessed in so many ways to be able to do this. I hope we have more trips in our future. Hope all is well with you and Pat. Hugs, Linda