Malta

You can easily spend a full week on Malta without even considering traditional pasttimes such as sunbathing or swimming. Culture and going out will do it... Whereas English is widely used and understood, you will hear little English spoken: Maltese people speak Malti, an Arab dialect.

Mnajdra

File size 70 kB. Choose JPEG or Java Viewer. Mnajdra is a set of three neolithic temples dating back to 3600 to 3000 BC and belongs - together with other similar buildings on Malta - to the oldest stone buildings which survived until today. Malta's temples are amazing, given the size of some of the stones used as well as the craftmanship needed for the carving, engravings and even paintings.

Dwejra

File size 107 kB. Choose JPEG or Java Viewer. The cliffs and bays at Dwejra, located at Gozo's western end, make up some of the most scenic coastline available in the Maltese archipelago.

Citadel, Victoria

File size 65 kB. Choose JPEG or Java Viewer. Victoria's Il-Kastell was apart from Mdina the only - though modestly - fortified city outside the La Valetta/Three Cities fortications. We peek over the southern wall towards the cathedral, the only animated part in the otherwise dead inside.

Fort St Angelo, Birgu

File size 69 kB. Choose JPEG or Java Viewer. Fort St Angelo, the old sea fort taken over by the Knights of St John and held throughout the Grand Siege of 1565.

Grand Harbour

File size 266 kB. Only JPEG. This is essentially an inset of the pano above, with a detailed view of Senglea (left) and La Valetta.

Upper Barrakka Gardens, Valletta

File size 72 kB. Choose JPEG or Java Viewer. The pleasant Upper Barrakka Gardens, which are laid out behind the walls to the left, offer a prime viewing spot onto the Grand Harbour area and the Three Cities.

St John's Co-Cathedral, Valletta

File size 130 kB. Choose JPEG or Java Viewer. What looks pretty sober from the outside turns into an overwhelming baroque spectacle of forms and colors inside. Clearly, the main church of the Knights of St John represents the different attitudes towards power and respresentation which had developed in the formerly austere order throughout the 17th and 18th century and brought its eventual downfall.