Malta. History, more history & rabbits

We docked in Valletta, Malta this morning, under the guns of Fort Elmo and in the shadow of 30+ centuries of history. Malta’s location is a choke point along the Mediterranean Sea navigational lanes and from ancient Phoenician times, the island has been an attractive location for traders and invaders.

Even our old friend Napoleon Bonaparte dropped in for a brief stint of causing chaos and endearing Malta to England on his way to Egypt.

I was aware of Malta’s history as England’s “unsinkable aircraft carrier”, that it was extremely heavily bombed in WW2, the people digging miles of underground tunnels to survive, the story of Faith, Hope & Charity and being almost starved into submission. The convoy story of Operation Pedestal and the SS Ohio is amazing and this morning we stood on the parapets in the same place as thousands of Maltese stood, cheering in joy, when she made Port on August 15th, 1942

Quite a hot day and after subjecting Nancy to a ++overdose of military history stuff we settled into a nice street side restaurant where we found out the favorite Maltese cuisine involves some form of rabbit! Turns out the Maltese have a real thing for cooking rabbit!

Malta would certainly be a place I would come back to and spend some time . . . We barely scratched the surface todayRead more