Malta is piles of limestone lining the roads. It is flat slabs of limestone across the countryside. It is buildings of limestone carved into every shape possible.
Four hundred thousand people, more, are crammed into these tiny islands, just the three hundred square kilometres of them. There are also five hundred and eighty cars for each of those square kilometres. It has to look busy and feel crowded. Every strip of cultivable land is worked by smallholders. Those with memories of pre-tourist Malta (and there are 1.2 million tourists to fit into those three hundred square kilometres each year) have a fierce sense of attachment to their small plots and the memories of roaming the wild countryside. The smallest piece of reusable junk is collected and hoarded; stones are piled upon stones until a wall is made, then an enclosure, then a shack. A length of wood rises vertically from a small cairn with a metre of wire nailed to the top, moving gently in the breeze. Car wheels, bedsteads and shoe soles form the jetsam of southern Europe.
The coastline should be the most attractive feature of Malta. For once it deserves the epithet ‘rugged’ but too often it is pock-marked with luxury hotels, sewage outlets, military zones and private roads; restricting access at the same time as blighting the views. The roads are as rugged as the limestone hills and the limestone cliffs. All journeys are defined not just by the heavy traffic but by the boneshaking ride. With speed down to the progress of an averagely capable cyclist it is fortunate that distances are mercifully short.
Valletta is a magnificent city and for those with a fondness for sixteenth and seventeenth century southern european baroque it holds many treasures. From here the later stages of the Military Orders’ struggles with Islam can be well appreciated. The cathedral is a huge and exuberant building born of Spain and Sicily with grand proportions and much use of inlaid marble. The two masterpieces by Carvaggio, especially the beheading of Saint John, are almost worth the journey by themselves. The state apartments of the current government building lie in what was the home of the knights of Saint John. Strong, masculine rooms decorated by their masters, that remind us of their importance, both real and imagined.
Mdina is a museum town like hundreds that can be found in Italy or in Spain. Concentrated and intricate it has the unmistakable sense of existing for visitors, a monument to tourism. Plagued by hordes descending from tour buses nearby it breeds the same collection of poor restaurants, charmless bars, uninteresting museums and bored tourist office staff in which these places specialize. At the end of the narrow streets the bars send their prettiest employees, dressed in national costume, to urge the tourists to visit. There is also the obligatory luxury hotel, a five star palazzo which allows travel writers to tell us that the super rich can ‘enjoy the calm of the evening and the early mornings before the tourist hordes arrive.’
The major visitor attractions, after Valletta, are undoubtedly the remarkable early ‘temples’, limestone buildings of some size that pre-date the pyramids and which commonly earn the title of the ‘oldest free-standing buildings in the world’. Such early and intriguing monuments rightly draw our attention.
Gozo is quieter. Fewer cars, although the five star hotels – here called “resorts” – have sprung up alongside the traditional craft village. (I am still unsure which noun that ‘traditional’ refers to). None of this would matter so much if we could leave it all behind, escape to the wild cliffs and the coast or to the unspoilt countryside. But there are few beaches and those that exist are overshadowed by concrete hotels. The cliffs can be fine but rarely are they accessible.
The built environment does not generally add to the islands’ attraction. Block-built, single-storey, square-planned, flat-roofed dwellings sprawl from the older town centres which do retain buildings of charm. Balconies dominate, helped by the fact that this is baroque Europe, a place where balconies are king. This is aristocracy at its most virulent and least accountable, where space is needed to be more flamboyant than the neighbours.
Massive churches are scattered liberally around Malta and Gozo. Quite exceptionally large and ornate for such a small place they truly dominate the towns and surrounding countryside. Bell towers flank giant domes in even modest towns acting as landmarks for the many large ships passing the coast as well as for the luckless drivers following unsigned roads.
Gozo is the home of Malta’s best restaurant. Ta Frenç serves the best fish soup that I have ever tasted, as well as a superb dish of rabbit in white wine. It is rare to encounter food of this quality anywhere, least of all just outside one of the ugliest resort towns on the islands, Marsalforn. But this is not a country famous for its cuisine and in various other outings to different well-regarded restaurants there was always a certain something missing.
The Maltese like to eat however and at local level the food is filling and traditionally made as well as moderately priced, especially outside the more famous areas. The local wine, inevitably a rather hit and miss affair for a first time visitor, is good value.
Accommodation is easy to find in the tourist areas and is not expensive outside the high season. However it can be both scarce and expensive for those with a taste for tradition. Hotels with character are almost non-existent outside Valletta, the capital, and Mdina. Otherwise farmhouses and guesthouses are the best choice for the visitor with a sense for the past.
