VALLETTA, MALTA: A BIG BOOM, A FRENCH NAVY SHIP, DELICIOUS MALTESE FOOD, A SUPER PORT!

Tuesday, November 10, 2026
Day 36/50
Valletta, Malta
76F, sunny!
 

French Navy Frigate, Forbin

View of Valletta, Malta from our ship

Navy Patrol Ship

This was another wonderful day! It started with a big boom this morning. When we looked out the balcony, we saw a French Navy Frigate, Forbin, entering the Grand Harbor of Valletta!  The frigate, Forbin, fired a salute and then there was a reciprocal Maltese gun salute from the Upper Barrakka Gardens.  [Of course I had to figure all of that out online].  What a beauty, and the ship was accompanied by a French Navy Patrol Ship.  https://themalteseherald.com/2026/11/10/watch-french-frigate-forbin-recieves-gun-salute-as-it-enters-the-grand-harbour/

 

We had a Food Tour that we arranged with Shore Excursions, and our next adventure was a short walk to an extreme elevator that took us to Upper Barrakka Gardens.  

Welcome to Valletta

A caution!

TK on the walk to the elevator

Elevator-very high

Views from the Upper Barrakka Gardens

Grand Harbor

Fortification wall and city

Allura and the Island Princess

Cafe in a 16th century garden

Church Steeples

TK's coffee in a great setting!

After enjoying a cup of coffee, we met our tour guide, Tony Sammut at a reasonable hour, 10:30 a.m.  There were 10 in our group—a couple from Alabama on our cruise, 4 Brits and 2 Canadians who are vacationing in Malta.

 

Tony gave us a brief account of the history of Malta:  Phoenicians, Carthaginians, Romans, Arabs, Spanish, French, Knights of St. John, Napoleon, British until 1964, a Republic in 1974, entered the European Union in 2004.

 

Malta, an independent island nation, is made up of three major islands with a total population of 600,000. Tourism is important and this year they have had 6 million visitors.  The archipelago is located south of Italy, east of Tunisia, and north of Libya.

 

Valletta is the capital of Malta and has an estimated population of about 5,200 residents.  It is the smallest capital city in the European Union.  Valletta also holds the title of the southernmost capital city in Europe.  The Knights of St. John founded the city in 1566 after the Great Siege of Malta.

 

 World War II was a devastating factor, as Malta endured one of the longest and most intense aerial sieges of World War II. It served as a crucial Allied base in the Mediterranean from June 1940 to November 1942.  Perched at the heart of the Mediterranean, the islands were bombed heavily (16,000 tons of bombs over the 3 years) yet remained a crucial Allied base for disrupting Axis supply lines to North Africa. The resilience of Malta’s people and defenders became a symbol of wartime courage.

Tony showed us the Royal Opera House/Theater, a performing arts venue in Valletta erected in 1866. The theatre received a direct hit from Luftwaffe aerial bombing in 1942 during World War II. Prior to its destruction, it was one of the most beautiful and iconic buildings in Valletta.

Opera House ruins

Columns from the Opera House

Royal Opera House - 1866

Along the way

Government building

Our first food stop was at Jeff’s Pastizzeria where we enjoyed pastizzi, “Malta’s most beloved snack.”  It is a crispy golden pastry filled with savory ricotta cheese (or mushy peas). Pastizzi was like tiropita that I had in Santorini and Erie’s Panegyrie.  I guess I love crunchy pastries!

Pastizzi, considered street food!

On our way to the next food stop, we passed St. John’s Cathedral. Tony said it might look plain on the outside, but it was an explosion of Baroque on the inside. He also mentioned that Caravaggios’s “Beheading of St. John the Baptist” was inside. I wanted to go there after the tour, but the line for tickets was intimidating. Next time! 

Front entrance to the Co-Cathedral of St. John

Back entrance to the Cathedral

I studied this Caravaggio in art history classes in France. According to the Internet, echoed by my teacher, “Caravaggio’s ‘Beheading of Saint John the Baptist’ (1608) is one of the most overwhelming images of martyrdom in Western art. Painted for the Oratory of St. John’s Co-Cathedral in Valletta, Malta, the vast canvas turns a prison courtyard into a stage where time seems to stop at the exact instant of sacred violence. The scene is spare and silent. A single brutal gesture—an executioner leaning to finish his task—holds the entire picture in suspension, while nearby figures register shock, pity, and ritual duty. It is Caravaggio at his most austere and monumental, stripping away ornament so that the viewer faces the raw question of justice and mercy.”  The image of this painting can be googled.  https://classicalcanvas.org/a-complete-analysis-of-beheading-of-saint-john-the-baptist-by-caravaggio/

Our second food stop was the Museum Café--- we were taken “downstairs” to a very small room with thick stone walls.  The food treat was a Maltese classic, “imqarrun,” a meat based baked pasta. It was very similar to the Greek pastitsio. Ingredients could include penne pasta, minced pork meat, tomato sauce, tomato paste, onion, garlic, curry, cumin, paprika, oregano, thyme, rosemary, bay leaves, olive oil, salt, pepper, 2 raw eggs, milk, and kefalotiri cheese.  This dish was delicious!

TK and the Museum Cafe

A few steps down to a "basement"

Delicious Baked Maltese Pasta 

Imqarrun

Tony spoke about the Knights of St. John, and I am not sure that I understood everything. We noted a large building that was used as barracks for the Knights during the Crusades, in the period of 1530 to 1798.  They transformed Malta into a fortified stronghold, repelling the 1565 Ottoman siege, and building Valletta as their new capital.  Originally these knights were doctors and nurses who cared for the Pilgrims during the Crusades.

A very whimsical art display at a museum

we stopped at briefly

Clothing = Plastic

 Our third food stop was at the Valletta Food Market for a plate of fava beans, mashed dark beans, pepper cheese, crackers, bread soaked in tomato, olives, dried tomato, and sausage slices. I especially liked the crackers and the mashed beans.  Some of our tourmates drank a Maltese beer, but we tried “Kinnie,” a soft drink made from bitter oranges and herbs. Tony said it was an acquired taste and as I drank more, it tasted fairly good. TK was a hard no.

Valletta Food Market 

Our shared plate 

Kinnie

Square

Along the way

Our final food stop (with Tony) was Tal-Kafe, Traditional Maltese Coffee Shop.  This coffee combines coffee, chicory, cloves, and aniseed. I thought it was good, others not so much. The pastry served with the coffee was “imqaret,” date-filled and infused with orange and spice.  That was tasty. 

Tal-Kafe

Inside Tal-Kafe

Maltese Coffee--served warm

Basket of blurry imqaret

After such a nice food tour, we were on our own.  We wandered in and out of shops and then decided to have gelato.  That certainly capped a very pleasant day in Malta. 

 

Evergreen Gelateria

Our peach and strawberry gelato

I love Valletta! First, it is laid out in an organized grid, and even though the city is not flat, it is easily walkable.  We could not possibly get lost!

 

And it inspired some memories from TK’s Navy visits. He remembered that on his way back to the USS Columbus from Valletta on a tender ship, he actually dove into the Grand Harbor.  I don’t even want to think about a young sailor doing something like that after being on shore leave for the day. He said he did get into a bit of trouble for doing that.  Nobody would have believed he was one of the first Rescue Divers for the Erie Fire Department thirty years later.

 

Good night, Malta!

TK’s Takes: Best weather so far. We weren’t cold, even a little warm.  He liked the elevator, better than walking 1/3 mile uphill. Our tour covered only a couple streets but we saw a lot of things, things we probably would not have seen food we would not have tried. His favorite food was the pastizzi that we had first.  Sorry, Donna, no cats today.

TK's photo of a pigeon drinking out of a bowl