The dry, sandy and rocky island with the sandstone buildings reminded us a lot of Jordan!

The sheer face of the walls rising up from the waters is mind blowing. To give you an idea, the St. Mary’s Tower that you can see is about 4 stories tall. The island used to produce a lot of cumin at one time and hence the name. The current population of the whole island is a whopping 2!! A priest and a policeman. Who commute to work to Malta island everyday!

Those are jellyfish. We saw hundreds and hundreds of them!

This is in Cirkewwa.

First, I was wondering why all those cars and trucks were lined up there without moving. Then I realized – all of them were also waiting for the boat like me. About 100-150 vehicles got on to our ferry. And there are about 40 ferry crossings every day between Malta and Gozo. That is a lot of traffic between the two islands once you realize that Malta is only 17 miles by 9 miles and Gozo is even smaller at 9 miles by 4.5 miles.

I did not realize this but Malta is the fourth most densely populated sovereign country in the world!

If anybody remembers the island called Ogygia in Homer’s Odyssey, well, this is that island. I am guessing a few things have changed since then.

Found this in Valetta. Never seen this or heard of this in any other country. After all the climbing up and down the streets I just did, I need access to this minister, just about now!!! I did not find any suggestion box around the ministry, but I was going to suggest that it might be more to the point to have the minister’s parking spot a few hundred yards away from his /her office so that he/she can stay active!!

Jokes apart, have you seen anything like this?

Every single street is packed with folks eating dinner or drinking. There is just some small space left to walk along either side. And these streets go up and down about 5-6 stories. The tables are set up on the inclined streets! Every other server is from Nepal or India. The whole area is seeping in energy. We tried out the local buses today. Very efficient, I must say!