In January 2013 we had a weeks holiday with Thomson Holidays at the Mellieha Bay Hotel in Malta.The hotel is on the opposite side of the Island to the Airport, but the Island is only 17 miles long, so even with other drop off's the transfer was only about an hour, which wasn't too bad.
It was already very dark when we got to the Mellieha Bay Hotel, but we still headed strait out onto our balcony to check out the views of Malta:
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| Looking right from room B114 of the Mellieha Bay Hotel. |
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| Looking across Mellieha Bay from our hotel room. |
On our first morning I woke up early and headed out of the Mellieha Bay Hotel to greet the morning sunrise in Malta for the first time. That day we all went out around the bay to have a look around and even ventured into the sea for a short swim, it was a bit cold (it was January!), but I have felt worse!
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| Looking through the middle of one of the lounges. |
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| I took this HDR photo as the sun was just starting to rise. |
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| My wife Yolanda out on the balcony enjoying the sun. |
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| Our hotel room, basic, but still very nice and was perfect for our needs. |
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| The front of the Mellieha Bay Hotel in Malta. |
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| This photo of the Mellieha Bay hotel was actually taken with my waterproof camera from the middle of the bay! |
On the Thursday we decided to venture a bit further from the hotel,so we headed to Valletta, the capital of Malta.
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| We woke up to more beautiful views across the bay. |
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| The hotel was being redecorated, we didn't get any noise, but it was scary watching them sometimes!!! |
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| Valletta had many interesting building to see, explore and photograph. |
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| National Museum of Archaeology was a great place, lots of history, some dating back 9,000 years+ |
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| The were also many interesting statues all over the city. |
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| Even the normal streets around Valletta were interesting, if rather hilly in places! |
On the Friday we decided to try out Mediterraneo Bio / Marine Park, sadly the weather was not great and so there were more staff than visitors, being the winter it was looking rather run down and was a bit expensive for what it was, but the staff were very nice and helpful and the animals were cute!
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| They had a great reptile house at Mediterraneo, this lizard was my favourite! |
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| The Sea Lion show was very good, we got very close to them and the information was good. |
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| This Sea Lion was very friendly!!! |
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| The Dolphin presentation was also interesting and exciting to watch. |
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| More Dolphins in the presentation, they had 8 in total (not all on show) |
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| A very cute albino snake in the Reptile house |
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| My wife and daughter in the Mediterraneo cafe. |
Saturday we decided to go on holiday from our Malta holiday and jumped on a ferry to the Island of Gozo, great place apart from the annoying taxi drivers!
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| An old World War 2 Pillbox (gun turret) just along the coast from the hotel. |
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| A very beautiful little church on the hilltop above Mgarr and the Gozo ferry port. |
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| One of the many sweet wild lizards we spotted while exploring. |
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| There were loads of Land Rover Defenders around, they are ideal for the terrain that they have there. |
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| Heading up the hill trying to escape from just one of the very annoying taxi drivers that do hassle you around the port, two of them followed us and kept going on at us about all the places they could take us, but they didn't seem to understand that I like to explore slowly on foot! |
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| My wife and daughter overlooking Mgarr on the Island of Gozo. |
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| When we got back to the hotel I decided to try out the unheated outdoor pool, there were people out on their balconies watching me! It was rather cold!!! lol |
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| The outdoor pool after dark, looking very pretty! |
Sunday we went back to Valletta for another look around, for a small place it has a lot of history to look around!!!
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| A WW2 memorial bell tower overlooking the harbour at Valletta. |
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| More of the interesting side streets of Valletta in Malta. |
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| My daughter at the entrance to one of the theatre's (I think) |
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| One of the many stray / feral cats living around Valletta, they even have special places for them to go and feed. |
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| Armed guards protecting one of the important buildings. |
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| Valletta is very hilly and split over many levels, so they built this very fast glass lift to make it easier to get back to the top. |
Another early start for me as I wanted to make the most of our last full day, but the whole day was spent around the Mellieha Bay area, including a trip up to the Red Tower.
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| Very early morning very of the church that overlooks Mellieha Bay. |
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| Sunrise from just outside the restaurant part of the hotel. |
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| My wife Yolanda outside the Red Tower. |
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| Yolanda and Joanne photographing each other while being photographed by me! |
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| Yolanda sitting under one of the many statues. |
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| A daytime view of the church up on top of the hill. |
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| Our little statue we bought, all the statues over there seemed to have the theme of larger women, nice to see its not just me that likes them! |
Our last half day 8o( We went on the bus to Sliema for a final bit of exploring, before heading back to the Mellieha Bay hotel to relax for a while before our flight home.
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| Yolanda enjoying a cup of tea with some rather quiet friends! 8o) |
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| Inside the shopping centre in Sliema. |
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| Joanne down by the waterfront in Sliema. |
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| Joanne with big ears! lol I made her pose there, but she didn't know why until after it was taken. |
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| Yolanda and Joanne chilling out before flying home. |
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| Flying back to very cold and grey England and missing Malta already. |
If you want to see more photos and larger versions of all of these, then follow this link for
Hundreds more Mellieha Bay and Malta holiday photos
Constructive comments always welcome! - Dean
