Monday 27 May  -  St Julian's, Malta
Our day began at 3.15 this morning, and clutching our breakfast bag we boarded our taxi at 4.00am. Apparently it takes between 1 hour and 1 1/2 hours to get to the Catania airport but we beat the Monday morning traffic jams.  40 mins and we were there. A great time to travel.  Nothing was open at the airport so we looked for somewhere to sit and consume our packed brekkie. Ah, there was dear old Mackers so we settled ourselves in there and logged into their internet. God bless the golden arches with its lights on. A short time thereafter a woman stepped out of the lift and looked absolutely horrified at us. We're not open said she. That's ok said I, we're fine thanks. No, you cannot sit there, said she. We're closed.  So where can we sit, said I. I don't know, said she, but not here, whereupon she disappeared and turned the lights off. I don't think the Colonel would be pleased. We certainly weren't.  There was absolutely nowhere to sit downstairs in the vast terminal and our check-in didn't open for another hour. However, down we went in the lift again and stood forlornly.  Ah-ha, there was a man lifting a roller door of a coffee bar and starting to put out tables and chairs . We were his first customers of the day. And I managed to get a wonderful gluten free brioche thing and a large cup of English breakfast tea steaming hot.  Up yours, MacDonalds.
In due course our Air Malta check-in opened and relieved us of 42 kg of luggage and off we went to our lounge.  All good. The flight over was 40 mins and so clear. Hopefully you can see Peter's photos of the Island. We walked straight through customs and settled ourselves in that terminal with the essential cappuccinos.  Internet was quick and I was able to catch up with my fb photos from yesterday, and letters to friends and family. We had to wait until our Airbnb was cleaned out after the last guests but we were allowed to taxi up to St Julian's to drop our bags off. Excellent.
When we enter a new town we are so bewildered by the strangeness  especially here where the whole place is under reconstruction after the WWII annihilation . However, we stumbled across Joseph, (Yussef) an Arabian travel agent who had just enough English to give us lots of tourist brochures and make suggestions for our 9 night visit. He gave us such useful information such as where the best supermarket is, who sells the best garden produce and where to catch the hop-on-hop-off bus. By the time we had an omelette for lunch it was time to return to our cleaned little apartment and go to sleep.
Tonight we strode confidently into the night in search of food (again). Well  what a buzz!!!! We found a fabulous restaurant down at the harbour's edge and after the best rabbit stew in red wine sauce, strolled around the magnificent new nightlife centre clutching our gelato.
I think we are going to be very happy in Malta.