A room with a view

The last two days we have been on a mini holiday to Gozo – the 2nd smaller island of the Maltese Islands and stayed at Xlendi Bay

St Patrick’s hotel on the shores of Xlendi Bay – the valley view top floor rooms (2) and a fabulous deck….

Wind back – 7am yesterday Jill and I left our southern town of Paola and headed north, collecting my cousin Anna on the way (a girls weekend midweek) !

We reached the top of the island around 8am catching the ferry (car and three gals) around 8am… half hour ferry and unload (car and gals again) and hit Victoria (Rabat) the capital of Gozo at 9, as the world was coming to life!

First stop coffee! Anna’s hat not so high, the bunting from the feast of St Maria still adorning the streetS!

Then the shops all opened at around 9.30…having Anna as our local guide, we explored new areas and shops poked away from the main drag (yes heating up and dripping!) And fabulous Gozo treasures…I even found the often visited charity shop still going strong even after the Covid struggles! The morning disappeared into a blur of diving in and out of the airconditioned shops -and around midday we sat down(in a cafe under a fan) for a lunch of shared pizza! Then the next activity was the Cittadella (basilica of Gozo) –

The fortress on the top of the hill – Jill took herself off to circumnavigate the fortress and Anna and I scrambled for shaded streets

Right side only! Heading down to relax on the steps…

Caught napping from Jill above! Relaxing in the shade! Around mid afternoon we headed off to visit the miracle church Ta Pina and on to Xlendi Bay to book into our hotel! (St Patrick’s hotel on the waterfront)

And swimming! To wash away the heat of the day! The copious amounts of water we had drunk barely keeping us hydrated, it was certainly time to sit in the shade at a seaside bar (restaurant) and take on some more liquid refreshments!

I was a beer down when Jill finally received her cocktail!

Back to the penthouse apartment (room) and showers all round, having checked out the menu at “Pirates Gallery” (the bar of choice – mainly due to the shade) we had booked in for dinner at 8pm!

A team Photo after a fabulous dinner of local specialities!

A big day of walking, shopping, eating and lots of liquid, we retired and slept like babies!

The next morning, included in our hotel room was a full breakfast! Of everything you could want….and we fulled ourselves to the brim! planning a swim before checking out at midday!

Breakfast view! And a walk around the point to walk off full tummies!

The inlet where the baby sharks are born (so they say)

And a morning wake up swim, before heading back to pack up, shower and hit the road on day two!

The afternoon before, we were very proud of ourselves to find a park(for the night) in the shade of trees and where we could keep an eye on Vivienne (the car) from our balcony! Only to find upon return the next morning, the birds had taken a huge delight in covering her with their excretement! We couldn’t even see from the windows and with the heat their droppings had cemented like concrete all over the car! Anna raced off to buy water while Jill and I used our wet (swimming) towels to at least clean the windows so I could see out while driving! Not a good clean but good enough to see us through the day!

A visit to the craft village – more water! More sweating and Vivienne (the car) performing like a champion in the heat – aircon on when going downhill and off getting up the steep climbs of Gozo!

The view from the top of Zabbar back towards the capital (Victoria) before descending (very slowly) down a very off the beaten track steep decline to the shores of the northern salt pans in the coastal rocks! Around the coast to Marsalforn (a coastal seaside tourist town) for an afternoon hit off caffeine (still full from breakfast – no food needed)

Nearing 3pm we decided – getting hotter and wetter (sweating) it was time to head back to the car ferry and start our journey home! Luck was on our side and we were the second to last car to load on the next ferry! Arriving back at Anna’s house around 5pm! We offloaded a very tired (and hot) Anna and headed south. Today the temperature hit 47degrees! So we did very well with our adventures – fueled by water to make it home in three pieces!

However, last job of the day was to clean Vivienne (the car) as her blue paintwork was dotted with brown and white caked on bird poo! I sent Jill with the bags and washing upstairs (with strict orders to put my beer in the freezer) and I scrubbed and hosed Vivienne in the street (at least in the shaded side) another round of dripping sweat!

It was time to relax – showers on the deck from the hose, more cold drinks and fall into bed! A great midweek weekend mini break!