Day 19 - Malta

We began the day by getting up and eating breakfast on the balcony as the ship pulled into the harbor.  The sun shone on the limestone, fortress walls of Valleta, Malta.  They reminded me of the forts in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico built in the 16th century by the Spainards.  Later on we found out that these walls in Malta were built during the same time period.  After breakfast we got onto the buses for another exciting day.  The first thing we noticed is that the driver's side of the bus is the right-hand side, like in Great Britian.  Malta was ruled by the British until the 60's and left behind some things to remember it by, including English as a second official language.  Our tour guide spoke English very well, something much appreciated compared to our guide from Tunisia who had a very heavy accent combined with the fact that the microphone on the bus wasn't working well.  The commonly spoken language there, however, is Maltese which phonetically is like Arabic, except they use "english" letters instead of the Arabic letters and write left to right like we're used to.

Entering the harbor of Malta

The island of Malta is one of the more interesting places we have been.  It is very clean.  While it isn't as picturesque as Santorini, it is a very beautiful place and felt very safe.  St. Paul and some other prisioners shipwrecked here while on their way to Rome for trial, which is recounted at the end of Chapter 27 in the book of Acts.  While here, many began to accept the Christian faith.  It was interesting to find out that 99% of the 380,000 inhabitants are Roman Catholic!  How interesting it would be to live there.  When someone asked the tour guide if most of the people practice their faith, she said that most do, but some only go to Mass on Sundays instead of daily.  There are 364 churches on the island, almost one church for each day of the year, so it wasn't hard to find them.

The tour guide led us into the heart of the capital city.  It was bussling with locals and tourists.  Of course, Pope Benedict XVI has declared 2008 to be the year of St. Paul.  Since St. Paul is very special to Malta, there were banners celebrating the year of St. Paul everywhere we looked in the city.  Our first stop was near the Church of St. Catherine.  After looking at the outside of this church, we went to a local park overlooking the harbor.  The view was spectacular.

Malta harbor from park (our cruise ship on the right)

Next we went to St. Paul's shipwreck church.  As soon as we walked in, I was stunned at how beautiful it was.  The most ornate church I have been in was no match for this church.  There were murals all over depicting various phases of Paul's life.   Unfortunately we were not allowed to take pictures, presumably to protect the paintings which are old.  Inside is a large statue of St. Paul that is carried around the city in procession on feast days.  Also inside is part of the marble column on which St. Paul was beheaded in Rome.  Next we went across the island to St. Paul's church and grotto.  Within the grotto underneath the church, St. Paul was held prisoner there until they left the island to continue their journey to Rome.  With the local parishoners, we attended Mass there in Maltese.  One of the benefits of us being Catholic is that although we couldn't understand anything that was being said, all of us knew exactly what was happening.  After Mass, we went to lunch where we ate swordfish and some appetizers that included goat cheese, beans, and salad. We could tell we were getting close to Italy because wine was served with lunch.

Religious symbols are shown freely

Next, we went to the older Arab city of Mdina and overlooked the island of Malta atop a fortress wall.  To get inside the city we had to walk through an archway in the wall where we could see just how thick the walls were, 20-30 feet!  Within the city is the cathedral for the island, Sts. Peter and Paul church. After some shopping, we headed back to the ship for dinner.  Katie had a throbbing headache so she stayed back in the room while I went to the dining room.  Because of our early start the next day, we went to bed early. The most interesting part of today's excursion was the way that everyone celebrated their Cathlic faith. Statues of saints and the Holy Family were everywhere! The people are not afraid of offending anyone and are not concerned with separating their faith with their lives. It was refreshing and wonderful to be in such a place!

Cathedral of Malta