Travel and Tourism in Malta

Gozo Island

Gozo, known in Maltese as Ghawdex, is Malta's quieter, greener, more rural sister island, and for many visitors it becomes the unexpected highlight of a Maltese trip. The ferry crossing from Cirkewwa in northern Malta to Mgarr harbor in Gozo takes approximately twenty-five minutes on the regular Gozo Channel Line service, a short enough journey that it can be done as a day trip but rewarding enough that many travelers choose to stay for several nights. The island moves at a different rhythm from Malta — more agricultural, more traditional, less dominated by the resort infrastructure that lines much of Malta's northern coast.

Victoria, known in Maltese as Rabat (the same name as Mdina's neighbor, reflecting the Arabic word for settlement outside a fortified city), is Gozo's capital and largest town. It sits in the center of the island and is dominated by the Cittadella — the fortified hilltop citadel that rises above the town and provides one of the most remarkable views in the entire Maltese archipelago. The Cittadella, also known as the Citadel, has been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site as part of the Fortifications of the Knights of Malta. Its origins go back at least to the Bronze Age, and it has been fortified continuously since ancient times, but the current walls date primarily from reconstruction ordered by the Knights of St. John in the seventeenth century following their humiliation in 1551 when an Ottoman raid enslaved virtually the entire population of Gozo and carried them off to North Africa.

The story of that 1551 raid is central to understanding the character of the Cittadella and the mentality of its builders. The entire population of Gozo — estimated at between five and six thousand people — was seized by Ottoman forces under the corsair admiral Turgut Reis (known to Christendom as Dragut) and transported to Libya as slaves. Only a handful of people escaped, and the island was left almost entirely depopulated for years afterward. When the population gradually recovered and repopulated the island, the Cittadella was reinforced with the explicit intention of providing a place of refuge for the entire population in case of future attack. A law was passed requiring all inhabitants of Gozo to sleep within the Cittadella walls every night, a regulation that remained theoretically in force until the eighteenth century.

Within the Cittadella's walls today, visitors find a fascinating mixture of ruins and functioning institutions. The Cathedral of the Assumption stands on the highest point, a baroque building begun in 1697 whose most extraordinary feature is its painted ceiling — a trompe l'oeil masterpiece depicting an elaborate vaulted nave and dome that does not in fact exist, the cathedral having run out of funds before the true dome could be built. The illusion is so convincing that visitors regularly enter expecting a domed space and are brought up short by the realization that the spectacular vault above them is painted. The Cittadella's Archaeological Museum houses prehistoric artifacts from Gozo, including finds from the Ggantija Temples, as well as Roman, medieval, and Renaissance material. The Old Prison, the Folklore Museum, and the Natural Science Museum occupy various corners of the Cittadella's residential areas, and the walls themselves offer spectacular views in all directions across the island and the surrounding sea.

Ta' Pinu Basilica, located in the northwestern part of Gozo near the village of Gharb, is Malta and Gozo's most important pilgrimage site. A modest seventeenth-century chapel on the site was the location of a reported miraculous apparition in 1883, when a local woman named Karmni Grima heard a voice calling from the chapel and, with a sick companion who subsequently recovered, began a devotion that rapidly spread across the entire Maltese community. The current neo-Romanesque basilica was built between 1920 and 1931 to accommodate the growing numbers of pilgrims and stands prominently on a hillside, its twin towers visible from much of western Gozo. The side corridors are lined with votive offerings — model ships, crutches, paintings, photographs, letters of thanksgiving — the accumulated physical expressions of generations of Maltese faith in the basilica's miraculous intercession. Whatever one's attitude toward such beliefs, the intensity and sincerity of the devotion evident in these offerings is impossible not to find moving.

The Azure Window was, until its collapse in March 2017, one of the most photographed natural features in the entire Mediterranean — a massive limestone arch standing in the sea at Dwejra Bay on Gozo's western coast, its central opening large enough to accommodate small boats. It featured in the opening episode of Game of Thrones, a Dothraki wedding scene filmed there in 2011, bringing it to global attention far beyond its already considerable fame among visitors to Malta. The arch had been eroding for decades, and geologists had been warning for years that its collapse was imminent. When it finally fell during a particularly fierce storm, the news traveled around the world in hours and the loss was mourned with a genuine sense of cultural bereavement by Maltese people and regular visitors to the island.

Dwejra Bay remains magnificent even without the Azure Window. The Blue Hole — a natural rock pool connected to the sea by an underwater tunnel — is one of the finest diving and snorkeling sites in Malta, and nearby Fungus Rock, a small dramatic pinnacle rising from the sea, takes its name from a rare fungal plant (actually a flowering plant, Cynomorium coccineum) that was harvested by the Knights of St. John for its supposed medicinal properties and guarded so jealously that unauthorized harvest was punishable by death. The Inland Sea, a small circular lagoon connected to the open sea by a tunnel through the cliff, offers boat trips through the tunnel and into the open water beyond — a short but atmospheric journey in traditional Maltese boats.

Ramla Bay on Gozo's northern coast is considered the finest beach in the Maltese archipelago by many visitors, distinguished by its deep red-orange sand — a color caused by the high iron content of the limestone from which the sand derives. The sand is warm to the touch and gives the beach a distinctive character entirely unlike the pale blonde beaches of Malta's north. A small statue of the Virgin Mary marks a cave in the headland at one end of the beach, and a ruined Roman villa visible in the dunes above the beach attests to the site's long history of human enjoyment.

Xlendi Bay and Marsalforn Bay, on Gozo's southern and northern coasts respectively, are the island's principal resort villages — small, relatively undeveloped by Mediterranean standards, and focused on the fishing and diving traditions that have always characterized Gozo's coastal communities. Marsalforn is particularly known for its salt pans — flat-bottomed rectangular depressions cut into the flat rock shelf at the water's edge, still used for the traditional production of sea salt by evaporation in summer. The salt pans date from at least the Roman period and possibly earlier, and the product of the modern salt harvest — rough, mineral-rich sea salt — is sold in local shops as a distinctive Gozitan food product.

The Ggantija Temples on Gozo represent the oldest above-ground human-built structure in the world that remains substantially intact — older, as noted, even than Stonehenge or the Egyptian pyramids. Built around 3600 BCE during the earliest phase of the Maltese megalithic temple tradition, Ggantija consists of two conjoined temples sharing a common forecourt and enclosed within a massive outer wall. The name derives from the Maltese word for giant — gganta — because the scale of the stone blocks used in construction so exceeded any medieval understanding of human capability that local tradition attributed the building to giants. The Maltese word ggant for giant derives from this association, not the other way around.

Traditional Gozitan hospitality is a frequently remarked-upon quality that distinguishes the island from its busier neighbor. Gozo's smaller scale, more homogeneous community, and less tourism-industrial economy create conditions in which visitors are more likely to encounter genuine, unscripted interaction with local residents. Farmhouses converted into holiday accommodation — the distinctive square-towered Gozitan farmhouse is an architectural type found only on this island — offer a style of experience quite different from a standard hotel.

Gozitan ceramics and lace represent the island's most celebrated craft traditions. The lace, known as bizzilla, is made using a pillow-lace technique involving bobbins and pins, producing delicate patterns of extraordinary complexity. Traditional bizzilla designs are specific to particular villages and families, and the knowledge has been transmitted from generation to generation in an unbroken line that the Maltese government has been working to have recognized as a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Heritage.

All UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Malta

Malta possesses a remarkable concentration of UNESCO World Heritage Sites given its small size, with inscriptions covering both the main island and Gozo and representing a span of human history from the Neolithic period to the early modern era.

The Megalithic Temples of Malta received their first UNESCO inscription in 1980, covering four temple sites: Ggantija on Gozo, the Hagar Qim complex on Malta, the Mnajdra complex on Malta, and the Skorba complex on Malta. The inscription was extended in 1992 to include three additional sites: the Tarxien Temples, the Ggantija complex (which had already been inscribed but was reinforced within the extended listing), and the Hypogeum of Hal Saflieni. The 1992 extension also saw the Hypogeum inscribed separately as a World Heritage Site in its own right.

The Hypogeum of Hal Saflieni (inscribed 1980) is the unique underground prehistoric burial complex in Paola described elsewhere in this guide, cut from the living limestone and containing the remains of approximately seven thousand individuals accumulated over a period of roughly a thousand years from about 3600 to 2500 BCE. It stands as the sole known example of an underground prehistoric temple and burial complex in the world.

The Megalithic Temples (inscribed 1980 and extended 1992) collectively represent the seven temple complexes already described: Ggantija on Gozo, Hagar Qim, Mnajdra, Tarxien, and Skorba on Malta, together representing the full span of the Temple Period civilization and its extraordinary tradition of large-scale stone architecture predating all other equivalent structures in the world.

The City of Valletta (inscribed 1980) was recognized for its outstanding universal value as a planned city of the Renaissance and Baroque periods built by the Knights of St. John after the Great Siege of 1565, containing an extraordinary concentration of baroque civic, religious, and military architecture within its compressed grid plan. UNESCO describes Valletta as one of the most concentrated historic areas in the world.

The Hal Saflieni Hypogeum, while technically part of the Megalithic Temples grouping, is often cited separately because of its unique character and the separate management regime it requires. The strict visitor limitation — eighty people per day — is maintained specifically to comply with conservation requirements associated with the World Heritage inscription.

Outdoor Activities and Beaches

Malta's beaches range from the spectacular to the modest, from wide sandy bays to small rocky coves, and the best of them are genuinely among the finest in the central Mediterranean. The island's geology — predominantly limestone — means that many of the coastline's most beautiful features are rocky rather than sandy, but the rocky coves and platforms that characterize much of the coastline have their own austere beauty and offer excellent swimming and snorkeling in the clear water.

Golden Bay in northern Malta is the largest sandy beach on the main island and justifiably popular, backed by a single large resort hotel and offering all the beach facilities a visitor might require: sunbed and parasol rental, water sports equipment hire, a beach bar and restaurant. The sand is genuine — a warm golden color against the blue of the bay — and the setting is attractive, with limestone headlands on either side. The bay can become very busy in July and August; arriving early in the morning or visiting on a weekday significantly improves the experience.

Ghajn Tuffieha Bay, immediately adjacent to Golden Bay and accessible by a flight of steps down a cliff face, is larger, sandier, and significantly less developed than its neighbor, lacking the bars and sunbed facilities of Golden Bay but offering a much more natural beach experience. The walk down the steps — and back up after a long day in the sun — deters some visitors and keeps the crowds manageable. The bay has a natural spring that gives it its name (Ghajn Tuffieha means apple tree spring in Maltese) and the surrounding fields and clay slopes backing the beach give it a greener, more lush setting than most Maltese coastal locations.

Mellieha Bay is the longest sandy beach in Malta, a broad, shallow bay at the northern tip of the island that is family-friendly, accessible, and popular with both tourists and locals. The beach is backed by a road and is somewhat lacking in natural drama but compensates with sheer scale and the reliability of good conditions for young children. It connects via a short walk to Ghadira Nature Reserve, a saltwater lagoon separated from the sea by the beach that serves as a significant stopover for migrating birds and is managed as a wetland reserve.

Ghajnsielem and St. Peter's Pool, near Marsaxlokk in southern Malta, represent a different category of Maltese beach: no sand at all, but rather natural limestone platforms at water level, polished smooth by wave action and providing diving platforms into the spectacularly clear water below. St. Peter's Pool in particular is a natural swimming hole of great beauty, accessible only on foot or by boat, surrounded by flat limestone shelves and turquoise water so clear that the bottom — several meters down — appears to be just below the surface. It is less suitable for young children than the sandy northern beaches but utterly beautiful for strong swimmers.

Pretty Bay at Birzebbugia is Malta's most southerly sandy beach, convenient to the Freeport container terminal — visible in the background and providing an industrial counterpoint to the beach — but with fine sand and good water quality. It is used primarily by locals from the surrounding towns and tends to be somewhat quieter than the more tourist-oriented northern beaches.

The Victoria Lines are a system of defensive fortifications built by the British colonial administration running east to west across the full width of the main island of Malta, taking advantage of the natural escarpment — the Great Fault — that separates the island's more elevated and arid southern plateau from the lower, more urbanized northern area. Built in the 1870s and 1880s and named for Queen Victoria, the Lines stretch for approximately twelve kilometers and are punctuated by a series of forts and gun batteries. The fortifications were never tested in battle — they were already obsolescent by the time they were completed — but they survive largely intact as a remarkable piece of Victorian military infrastructure and provide the basis for one of Malta's best walking routes, with panoramic views in both directions across the island.

Dingli Cliffs on Malta's western coast represent the island's most dramatic coastal scenery, a continuous stretch of limestone cliffs rising up to two hundred and fifty-three meters above sea level — the highest point in Malta — and dropping in near-vertical faces to the sea below. The cliffs extend for several kilometers south of the village of Dingli and offer walking along the cliff edge with unobstructed views out to sea and down to the wave-cut platforms and sea stacks at the base of the cliff. In spring the clifftop fields are bright with wildflowers and the entire area feels refreshingly remote from the busier parts of the island. At sunset, with the western sky turning orange and pink over the open sea, the cliffs are among the most beautiful places in the entire Mediterranean.

Hiking and walking trails are being progressively developed across both Malta and Gozo, with particular emphasis on the more rural and coastal areas that reveal the islands' geography most attractively. Gozo in particular is well suited to walking, with a network of country lanes and footpaths that traverse the island's agricultural interior — fig orchards, terraced vineyards, fields of tomatoes and melons — and connect its hilltop villages and coastal viewpoints. The Gozo circular walk, covering roughly the island's perimeter, can be done in stages over two or three days and provides an excellent overview of the island's varied landscape and character.

Festivals and Events

The Maltese festival calendar is extraordinarily rich for such a small country, reflecting a culture in which communal celebration — particularly in its religious, seasonal, and civic expressions — is genuinely central to community life rather than a performance for tourist audiences. While visitors are warmly welcomed at virtually all of these events, they were not created for visitors and they would continue in exactly the form they take regardless of whether any outsider was present to observe them.

Carnival (Il-Karnival) is held in February in the days preceding Ash Wednesday, centered on Valletta but with significant celebrations in Nadur on Gozo that have developed a reputation for a wilder, more satirical, and occasionally transgressive character than the more official main island festivities. Valletta's Carnival features elaborate floats, traditional dances, and colorful costumes in a tradition that dates back to the period of the Knights of St. John, who introduced Venetian Carnival traditions to Malta in the sixteenth century. The Nadur Carnival on Gozo, by contrast, is characterized by masked figures in increasingly elaborate and sometimes disturbing disguises who roam the village streets in an atmosphere of benign but genuinely uncanny mystery.

Holy Week, culminating in Good Friday and Easter Sunday, is perhaps the most emotionally significant period of the Maltese Catholic calendar. Good Friday processions take place in multiple villages across the island, the most famous being those of Valletta, Zejtun, Zebbug, and Mqabba. The processions feature life-size statues carried on the shoulders of groups of men — the statues depicting the various stations of the Passion of Christ and often of extraordinary artistic quality — preceded by robed and hooded penitent figures and accompanied by brass bands playing solemn music. The atmosphere is intensely devotional and genuinely moving regardless of one's personal religious commitments. Easter Sunday, by contrast, brings a complete reversal of mood: explosive fireworks erupting at the moment of the Resurrection announcement at noon, brass bands switching from dirges to jubilant marches, and the general sense of relief and joy that characterizes the Christian Resurrection celebration at its most unrestrained.

The Village Festas, which run from approximately June through September with particular concentration in August, are the heartbeat of Maltese popular culture. Each of the roughly sixty-odd parishes on the main island and about fifteen on Gozo has its own patron saint and its own annual feast day, and the week leading up to the feast day is a period of mounting celebration. The decorations begin going up weeks in advance: hundreds of colored lights strung from buildings, statues of the patron saint displayed in temporary street niches, the church facade illuminated with complex geometric light patterns that require months of preparation. The feast day itself typically features a morning Mass, an afternoon procession of the patron saint's statue through the village streets, and an evening of fireworks, band marching, and general celebration that continues well past midnight.

The competition between villages — and between the two rival band clubs that most Maltese villages maintain — adds a sporting dimension to the festa culture that has no precise parallel in other European popular celebrations. Village pride, identity, and honor are genuinely at stake, and Maltese people take with some seriousness the question of which village's festa is the most spectacular. The festa in Mosta, centered on the enormous rotunda church with one of the largest unsupported domes in the world, is celebrated with particular fervor; so is the festa in Senglea, one of the Three Cities, where the statue of Our Lady of Grace is carried in a grand procession through the historic narrow streets. Qormi, famous for its bread baking tradition, celebrates its feast with particular gusto; Zebbug and Zurrieq are considered among the most elaborate for the quality of their fireworks programs.

The Malta International Fireworks Festival, held each April, brings together pyrotechnic teams from Malta and across Europe for a multi-night competition on the Grand Harbour. The spectacle of professional-grade fireworks displays exploding above one of the most photogenic harbors in the world — the illuminated bastions of Valletta and the Three Cities as backdrop — makes this one of the most spectacular public events in Malta's calendar, and it is worth arranging a visit around if the dates align.

The Malta Arts Festival in late June and early July brings a program of theatre, dance, music, and visual arts to venues across Valletta, including outdoor performances in the dramatic settings of St. George's Square, the Lower Barrakka Gardens, and the harborfronts. The festival has grown significantly in scope and international profile since the Valletta 2018 Capital of Culture year.

Isle of MTV, the annual free outdoor concert held at the Floriana Granaries outside Valletta in July, brings international pop music acts to an audience of tens of thousands in what is reliably one of the biggest single events in the Maltese calendar. The combination of warm summer evening, an extraordinary limestone setting with views toward the Grand Harbour, and major chart artists creates an event that is both distinctly Maltese in its setting and entirely global in its musical culture.

The Malta Jazz Festival, held in July at Ta' Liesse quayside at the edge of Valletta's Grand Harbour, is a more intimate affair — three nights of jazz performances in a setting directly beside the water, with the illuminated bastions of Valletta as backdrop. International jazz artists of genuine reputation perform alongside Maltese musicians in an atmosphere that manages to be both sophisticated and relaxed.

Notte Bianca, held in October, is a one-night cultural event in which all of Valletta's cultural institutions — museums, galleries, churches, palaces — open their doors free of charge from sunset to midnight, hosting performances, exhibitions, installations, and events of every kind throughout the city. The event dates from 2005 and has grown to become one of the most popular public events in Malta, drawing tens of thousands of people to walk the illuminated streets of the historic city and experience its cultural heritage in a festive rather than institutional mode.

Christmas in Malta is celebrated with a warmth and enthusiasm that reflects the deep Catholic faith of the majority population and the pervasive British cultural influence on gift-giving and festive decoration. Cribs (presepji) — Nativity scenes — are set up in churches and public spaces throughout the islands, and crib-making is considered an art form with competitions and exhibitions. Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve is attended by large proportions of the population. The streets of Valletta are decorated with lights, and the general atmosphere of the pre-Christmas weeks is convivial and festive.