Up bright and early to hit Sarmizegetusa Regia (the ruins of the ancient Dacian people and another UNESCO site) when it opened at 9. The plan was to have a fairly easy going day adventure-wise (just one), then get to the bnb that I booked last night by noon and relax, work, blog, and do laundry. The drive from Hateg to the site was just stunning. I swear, Romania is so gorgeous!! I was on rural back roads the entire hour and half and couldn’t have been happier. And there were even a few places to pull over and snap a pic! I was the first one in the parking lot at 8:48am!! Woo-hoo!! But no sooner than I started walking up the long path to the site, cars started pulling in. That put a giddity up in my hitch, because I wanted to be the first to the top!! And I was. Went to the ticket counter. 10 lei. I headed toward the site and saw an audio guide icon. Went back. 20 lei ($5). A bit pricey, I thought. But ok, I’ll bite since I know zilch about this place. I should have saved my money. The audio guide was pretty bad….
Path from the parking lot to the site. It’s about 1 mile uphill, but not steep. Easy even for out of shape me. 🙂
So who are these Dacians (that I, admittedly, had never even heard of)? Well, honestly, we don’t really know much about them. They left no written records. And what records there are were written by the Romans, who conquered the Dacians about 1900 years ago. There were a bunch of different groups of people running around in the general area of present day Romania and parts of Eastern Europe. By about 500 BCE (2500 years ago!), the Dacians were a distinct group of people. It took them about 400 years to really get organized and build a serious civilization (I see why- this place was so remote there was no way they were going to get a phone signal, much less a data connection!). One of their kings moved the capital of the civilization to Sarmizegetusa Regia around 50 BCE. The next king really grew the civilization in the early 90’s CE. So much so, that he caught the attention of the Romans. Something you probably didn’t want to do back then… Especially if you were sitting on large gold and silver reserves as the Dacians were… The Romans first marched in and attacked in 102 CE. After that, the Dacians actually rebuilt Sarmizegetusa Regia and their other cities in the kingdom. So the Romans came back and issued the final crushing blow in 106 CE, ending the Dacian kingdom and heavily colonizing the area.
The Dacian site had 3 main parts to it. The fortress, the sacred area, and the settlements where the people lived. The fortress (or what was left of it) and the sacred area are the only parts open to the public. The first part you see is the fortress, or what is kind of left of it- basically some block walls, and some rock rubble.
I continued past the fortress area and followed the path to the sacred area. Now THIS is where things got interesting!! The first thing was an original portion of a road that led to the sacred place- about 2000 years old! And on the opposite side of the path from that was a break in the trees, and my first view of the VERY impressive sacred site!
There were remains of the column bases of temples. Now, we aren’t really sure what gods the Dacians worshipped, but we do know they were polythestic. The first picture is the “new” temple that was being constructed with that 2nd wave of Romans came along. The second picture is of an older temple. And there was a picture of what the temples would have looked like assembled, which was helpful.
Honestly the thing I was most impressed with was connected to this big round thing carved with notches like a slice of pie. There was signage that stated it was an altar. But the impressive part was that those notches were where “liquid” (the audio guide didn’t elaborate, dammit!) from sacrifices would run off of the altar. Ok, that’s cool, but the BEST part was where it would drain into. There was an entire sewer type system installed, that ran through the area and off into the woods. I don’t know why, but I was all about that sewer system! In fact, I did a whole video for class about it!
Most normal people (those who are not infatuated with ancient sewers) are most impressed by the huge circular temple in the middle of the lower field. It was originally built out of stones and wooden timbers, the latter of which has been recreated to show the shape of it. Like the other temples, this one would have had a roof on it. Again, not much is known about their religion, but there are concentric circles that make up the temple, and it’s thought that the innermost circle would be the most holy of the areas, with only the high priest being able to enter. Hmmmm….sounds a lot like the “holy of holies”…. The arrangement of the stones has been compared to Stonehenge.
I was at the site for a little over an hour, then headed out toward Sebes. Reached my airbnb right at noon. Maria, the host, didn’t speak English. We already know how fluent I am in Romanian. Unless we were going to be talking about entering a chicken with an apple and a cherry, I was screwed. But- she did speak SPANISH!! Woo-hoo!! A language that I can actually speak in semi-coherent complete sentences (all in the present tense, but still)!! And we communicated absolutely perfectly in Spanish! There was something about being able to use Spanish in Romania that was quite satisfying. I mean, I’ve used it all over Central America and Cuba and been fine. But to use it in Romania and have someone understand what the hell I was saying- well, I kinda felt like a rock star. No lie. I easily impress myself.
Maria left and I had the entire apartment to myself. I think the apartment buildings here might be a throwback to the communist times. They have that “blocky industrial” look and feel to them. But the apartment was large and lovely. And the best part (aside from only being $42 for the night)- A WASHING MACHINE!! My gummy ass, stinky shoes were long overdue for a solid washing… Put everything in and headed out to find food.
There was a grocery store and a pizzeria close by that Maria had shown me on google maps. First, the grocery store. It was really small and didn’t have anything I really wanted (like a damn roasted chicken- my kingdom for a roasted pui!!!). But lo and behold, they DID have Dr. Pepper! I couldn’t believe it! I have enough of them though from my spree in Bucharest, so I left empty handed and decided to go get a pizza.
Sebes is not a tourist town in the least. It was ALL locals here, which was nice. I walked through some more apartment blocks to the pizzeria which….was closed until 5. I’d die on the streets of starvation by then. Quick check of the map showed another restaurant called Restaurant Parc which was in…well, the park! I checked the reviews online. People said decent, cheap food, but menu in Romanian and no one speaks English. Hmmm. Intimidating (not withstanding the fact that I hate to eat in restaurants alone), but I’ve got this!! Walked in, sat down (nice view over a pond), waitress brought me a menu. I said thank you and she said you’re welcome. Well, probably everyone knows that. She brings me over a menu. Sure enough, 100% Romanian and all text- no pictures. I could pick out porc for pork and chicken is the first word I learned (pui), so I could tell the differences between those, but otherwise, flabbergasted. I pulled up google translate and started the laborious process of typing stuff in. The waitress came over and asked “Do you need help?” OH HELL YES!! Engliiiiiiiish!!!!!! She explained the menu to me, and I chose a pork cutlet with vegetables (traveler’s scurvy, the struggle is real) and a Pepsi. Food came, was really good, and less than $7 for the whole thing. I was rather pleased. 😊
That brown building on the right over the water is the restaurant.
Back to the apartment, hung out laundry, showered, worked, blogged. It was good to just chilllllllll for an entire afternoon. Tomorrow would be my last day with the car…
UPDATE:THIS happened to the road to Sarmizegetusa Regina about 4 days after I was there!! It’s closed now for an indefinite amount of time. I’m so lucky that I was one of the last people to get to see it! Hopefully it will be reopened soon.
The last day with the car. Kinda bittersweet, I suppose. I love the freedom of it, the adventure. But as much as I love Romania, I feel my time here coming to an end. Giving up the car is just the first part of making that real. My plan was to leave at 7:30 for the hour and a half car ride to Turga for my one adventure of the day- Salina Turda…the Turda Salt Mines. They opened at 9. Fate stepped in, in the form of the airbnb host showing up about 20 minutes late (my fault) and a couple of wrong turns that required some backtracking (google’s fault), so I ended up arriving about 45 minutes later than I planned. The drive from Sebes to Turda was nowhere near as glorious as all of the other days. Not a single place where I wished there was a turnout for a photo op. It was all main roads, very industrial for quite a ways, then just big open farmland. Eh. The least exciting of all the drives I have done over the past week, but considering all of the awesomeness I have seen, I can’t complain!
I pulled in at 9:45. Um, apparently this is a SUPER popular place on Monday mornings, because I literally got the last parking spot in the lot!Everyone else was having to park up the road a ways. There were even huge tour groups here- both school kids and adult tourists. Dang!
Went in and paid my 35 lei for entrance and parking (like $9). There were signs about a free audio guide app you could download on your phone from google play at izi.travel. Super cool, and there are places all over the world on the app!! I’m keeping it! Ok, with audio guide downloaded, it was time to head into the mine. And honestly, I had ZERO idea of what to expect. First, you descended a ton of stairs (FYI: Romania is not the place to be if you have mobility issues, just saying…). It got colder and colder as you went down. I am deathly afraid of even the thought of being cold, so when I researched and heard about people saying it was “chilly”, I decided to wear my ski pants from my Iceland/Scotland trip to stay warm. Those, a tshirt, and my rainjacket in my day pack. Well, apparently I have acclimated to cooler climates, because even though the mine is a steady 10-12 C (low 50’s F) year round, I never had to put my jacket on. Regular pants would have been fine.
Got to the bottom of the stairs, turned left, and said out loud, “What in the WORLD?!”. It was that shocking! This huge tunnel called the Franz Joseph transportation galley. It’s 917 m long ( over 1/2 a mile!!)- most of which was carved in the mid 1800s. After the mine was closed in 1932, it was used as a bomb shelter for the people of Turda, and then for cheese storage!! HA! Now it’s the main hallway for tourists to access the various parts of the mine. The tops of the walls are unbelievably smooth- with a marbled look to them. The bottoms of the walls are crusted with salt crystals. One little Australian boy was running his hand along it and stuck his fingers in his mouth, proclaiming it to be “really salty!”- much to his mother’s dismay.
Different tunnels and room branch off of the main galley. One is a medical treatment room, which is kinda interesting. You could see the patients inside through the glass (no tourists allowed), but I didn’t take pictures because, well, seems like that stuff should be private. Another path led off to a little room with some old mining tools and a staircase. I headed down. And OH. MY. GOD. There was this MASSIVE elevator shaft going down into the Rudolph mine!! You could either go down the stairs, or down the elevator. The line wasn’t terrible, but longer than the 4 minutes it said it would take to use the stairs, so I opted for stairs. To get to the stairs, you had to traverse an INSANE balcony thing that was about 17.395 miles long, barely attached to a wall, and about a zillion miles above the mine floor below. Fear of heights kicked in, and I basically scooted down the side with the wall, which was nowhere near far enough from the edge of the balcony for my liking. Made it to the stairs- 13 floors down. My knees said, “Screw you lady, we prefer the elevator.” about halfway down, but at that point I had no choice. Turned a corner and could really see the mine for the first time (since I refused to get near the balcony wall earlier). HOLY CRAP!! There was a FERRIS WHEEL down here!!! Made it to the bottom, and there wasn’t just a ferris wheel, but ping pong tables, pool tables, a playground, bowling- and an amphitheater for concerts….SO COOL!! You could see the salt stalactites on the ceiling- they grow about an inch a year and fall off when they reach about 3 meters (9 FEET!!).
I walked around a bit, and found another balcony. What the….???!!! There was another huge drop with a LAKE AT THE BOTTOM OF IT!!! Come to find out, this was the Terezia Mine- the oldest chamber where salt extraction started way back in 1690! You had two options to get to it. Elevator or stairs. Knees said, “You know what you better choose, bitch, or we are going to take you out.” Sigh. Luckily the line wasn’t long, and I only had to wait about 10 minutes (only 4 people per trip). Once down, there was a bridge to a little island made of salt waste, and you could rent boats. Mining stopped here in 1880. The walls and ceiling (120 m high!!) were just spectacular. Went to head back up, and the line for the elevator was about 25 people deep. At 4 people per trip, that was going to take forever. Knees were hating down, but might be ok with up. I decided to risk it. Holy heckle majeckle these stairs and the platforms between them were SO NARROW and steep!! People were coming up and going down, and you’d have to wait on the tiny platform in between flights because two lanes of traffic wouldn’t fit on the stairs. Then, people would have to squeeze by you. As we kept going up and up and up back to the Rudolph mine, people were huffing and puffing and making silly “I’m going to die” noises. It was kinda fun and we were all in it together. Breathlessness and exhausted muscles translate into every language. 😊
The ceiling of the mine. Waaaaaaaay up there!!
Made it to the top (barely), and from there, I was back in the Ruldoph mine (with the ferris wheel). Which meant I still had a hell of a long ascent to get back to the top! I opted for elevator. This one took 7 at a time, and I only had to wait for 2 cars. (video).
The wooden stairs are on the left- with a light on each floor. Elevator shaft on the right.
I headed back down the long Franz Joseph galley, and visited some of the other rooms. One was the extraction/trolley and the winch room. So the salt from the Rudolph mine was placed into huge buffalo leather bags (interesting, huh?!), and pulleys brought them up to this room, where they were put into trolleys to be sent to the surface. The trolleys were horse powered- literally! And it’s super sad. ☹ One or two horses were hitched to each arm of the winch. There was no electricity in the mine until 1910, so in the late 1800s when the winch was built, the room was only lit by torches. The horses would go BLIND after about 2 weeks of being in the mines, because when they were taken outside, their eyes couldn’t adjust to the sunlight properly! HORRIBLE!! After about 6 months, the horses were no longer able to work at maximum capacity and were “retired”. I hate to think what that meant….
There was another mine that you couldn’t see down into, but the marbling on the walls was just spectacular. From there, I headed back to the main galley and walked all the way to the end, where it dead ended. From that point, you could see the old original exit of the mine waaaaaaay down a tunnel. And that was the end of my mine tour. This was a really interesting stop, and I’m so glad I did it! Quite unexpected and unusual, for sure!!
A short hour long drive brought me to Cluj-Napoca- my final Romanian destination. I found Autonom and dropped off the car. Super easy!! From there, it was just a .8 mile walk to my airbnb. With the pack and the freaking ski pants, I won’t say it was the most enjoyable walk of my life, but I lived! I turned into the courtyard where my airbnb was, and LOOK WHAT IS LITERALLY RIGHT NEXT DOOR TO ME!!! Dear Coincidental Universe, There’s a point where you run the punchline into the ground. I’ve got it. Enough. Love, Mary.
Courtyard looking out from my door
That open door is my apartment. Do you see what kind of shop is RIGHT next to me?! 😛
Gorgeous church right across the street. This place is in the middle of old town.
Now, I will say, I wasn’t expecting much out of this airbnb. It was $15 a night for an entire private apartment. Yes, you read that right. $15 for an ENTIRE PRIVATE APARTMENT. I was spending 2 nights here. Imagine my surprise when I opened the door to what is now my most favorite airbnb in all of Romania!!! It is SO CUTE!!! There’s a nice little desk with a chair, a kitchen with a microwave (I was beginning to think those hadn’t made it to Romania yet, as it’s the first one I’ve seen!), a little fridge, and a sink. A cute bathroom where the toilet and shower are all just one room, except it’s big enough that they feel separate. A set of bunk beds downstairs, and a little loft with another twin bed. And not stark and plain like most of the places I’ve been in- this one is really decorated so cute with art and knick-knacks! The building is old- really old. From the literature that is in the room about it (in Romanian), it appears to have been built in 1597!! LOVE IT!!! There are even some exposed original interior stone walls which give it such a historic feel. Plus, it is literally right in the middle of the old town! The cathedral is right across the street! Seriously, the location, size, amenities, fact that it is all mine, and is only $15 a night- holy fuck, I’m moving in permanently!!
First order of business was food. I had only eaten a pepperoni stick and a granola bar all day- and the last meal was lunch at about 1pm yesterday- 24 hours ago! Walked to Carrefour and got a loaf of bread, a couple of bananas, a bag of chips, a candy bar, and 2 Dr. Peppers. $3.75. As I walked through the city, I was really digging the vibe. It’s very different than the other cities I’ve been to. A much younger vibe to it- a little more Westernish with more of a progressive feel. Tons of cafes and such. Super cool place. If I had to live in Romania, this is the city I would choose. Came back to the bnb to start work and…..NO WIFI (insert scream 😱). Something was wrong with it, the host is in Serbia and won’t be back until tomorrow morning. Oh well. Good excuse for a nap. I will have a LONG day of work ahead of me tomorrow, plus my very last Romanian adventure. I can’t believe my time here is almost over. 😢
So the wifi still isn’t fixed. Sigh. And I had some work that I really needed to get done this morning. Oh well, what can I do? I know! Go to the botanical garden! 🌹🌺🌻🌼🌷😀
It was a little less than a mile, so I walked. I’m telling you, the vibe of Cluj-Napoca is AWESOME!! It’s a university town, so that brings such a different feel to it. It’s just so busy and modern and cafes and younger people and…just cool! All of that, in a setting of beautiful buildings! Seriously, I could move here. Every modern amenity right at your doorstep, and the whole of Romania to explore just outside!
This is what I call a “cake” building. Decorations look like delicate icing!
Arrived at the gates of the botanical garden, and paid something really cheap- maybe like 10 lei ($2.50) to get in. WOW!! What a beautiful garden! It’s been around for almost 150 years, and is now a part of the university. And for being in the middle of the city, it’s pretty darn big- 14 hectares (34 acres!). When you first walk in, you enter the “Ornamental Garden”. It’s so nicely landscaped, and the flowers just just lovely!
This is the statue of the founder of the gardens- Alexandru Borza
Continuing down the path, you come to a large building, that is the botanical museum. A botanical museum? Hmmm. I stepped inside and was the only one in the building. And OH. MY. GOD. Talk about super cool old school botany!! I’ve seen labs like this for animals (especially for fish and invertebrates when I was studying marine biology at Texas A&M at Galveston), but NEVER for plants!! There was row upon row upon row of preserved specimens. Some in jars, some dried, some pressed. There were fossils. There was EVERYTHING!!! And it was mine, all mine!! Oh, but my little science geek heart was in heaven! 🤓😇 What a fun and unexpected find!
The rose garden is in front of the museum building
The garden is separated out into a bunch of different manicured gardens, each with a particular focus. But there is plenty of “wild” here, too. With huge trees and overgrown brush, a little stream, and lots of trails wandering in and out. You really felt like you were miles away from any kind of civilization.
Japanese Garden
I got to this and turned my happy ass right around. Bridges…there’s always a bridge… Dear Romania, Bridges should have ALL of the slats! Love, Mary
Manicured gardens, a botanical museum, wild areas….what more could you ask for? How about GREENHOUSES!! They were HUGE and just beautiful!! Some of them were closed, but there was a complex with 3 really big ones joined together with a main building that were open.
Like seriously, these were so big that I could have laid in them and not touched the edges!
I spent about an hour and a half in the gardens and loved every second of it (well, except for that bridge!). And now it was lunch time and I was starving!! I headed back into town to try to find some Romanian food. Came across a little cafe (I suck for not remembering the name of it!!), where the menus were in English and the waitress spoke English as well. I ordered a plate that had 4 cabbage rolls with some kind of minced meat inside, a piece of ham, and something that looked like sauerkraut but was not. It was WAY better than sauerkraut! All of that for I think 15 lei ($4.25).
Came back to the airbnb and YES!! The wifi was back up and running!! Did some work and blogging and packed up for tomorrow. 😭😭 But no time for crying! I still had one more Romanian adventure up my sleeve for the evening….a night tour of Hoia Baciu- one of the most haunted forests in the world…👻👽💀😲 Of course, Brian was thrilled to death that I was going into some dark ass haunted forest in the middle of the night alone with some Romanian guy I found on the internet. 🙄 You picked a traveler for a fiancee, babe. #dealwithit
I met Alex of the Hoia Baciu Project at 7pm for our 4 hour tour. The main reason I was going was to get some creepy stories and do some filming for my “Fantastic Beasts” class. When I got in the car, Alex asked me what I knew about the forest. I told him that I hadn’t done a lot of research, because I don’t like to go into adventures with a ton of expectations, but I knew that it was very haunted. He immediately said, “It’s not haunted unless you bring your own ghosts.” Um, ok, that’s not what’s plastered all over your website. Way to IMMEDIATELY kill the vibe of a haunted forest tour before we even get to the damn forest. Minus 5 points….
We parked along the road outside of town at the bottom of a really big hill. At the top was the forest. We started hiking up, and soon reached a place where there was a hole through the trees- the portal to Hoia Baciu.
Forest at the top of the hill
View of the Cluj suburbs from the top
In we go!
Once you step in, it’s almost like the forest closes in behind you. We didn’t walk too far until we arrived at a clearing. Not just any clearing- THE clearing. This is supposedly the most paranormal place in the forest. And this is where I’ll give a bit of an explanation. I am a logical person. I am a scientific person- with a science degree and I teach science. I live off of rational thought, not emotions. And on the flip side of that, I have had this weird ability to see and feel and know things other people can’t since I was extremely young. In fact, my first memories are from around 3 or 4 years of age and having “experiences”. And they have continued throughout my adult life. It’s not something I experience every day. It’s not something I pursue. It’s not something I enjoy. It’s not something I want. I was taught that they were bad and I would go to hell, so I quit talking about them and kept them to myself for many years. As an adult, I found out I was adopted. And lo and behold, it “runs” in the family. That said, I didn’t come into this forest looking to find something or expecting to feel anything. I’ve been in places that are supposedly super duper haunted and felt nothing, I’ve been in normal places and felt all kinds of things. No control over it (which is why it’s not my favorite personality trait…).
So back to this clearing. It’s this huge area where there’s nothing but some grass. No trees at all. It’s literally like there’s some kind of force keeping the trees from taking root inside. I will say, it does look really odd and out of place. There are stories of UFOs and ghosts and all kind of things here. Alex showed me some pictures and give me a little information about the legends. I told Alex someone should come in there and do soil samples and try to figure it out- maybe there is a chemical reason behind why the trees don’t grow here. Because I will ALWAYS default to a scientific and logical explanation over a paranormal one.
People come into the clearing and camp and do rituals and things…here’s a fire ring left behind
That little gap between the trees is supposed to be the most haunted area of the clearing
We went inside the gap. There was this weird zig zag tree that some researcher on Hoia Baciu claims was perfectly straight 20 years ago. Alex and I don’t believe that for a second.
Inside the forest looking toward the clearing. You can see how the plants just stop at the perimeter. Weird.
After we went through that clearing, Alex asked me if I was sensitive to paranormal things (I hadn’t offered the information). I told him yes, and that I felt nothing there. We continued on. As we walked and talked, I learned that Alex loves this forest. Like seriously LOVES it, and feels very protective of it. I could tell he really didn’t like the whole “haunted” moniker that it has, even though that’s what he’s built his business around. He seemed truly fascinated by the forest, and in a weird way, bonded with it. And I felt like it was bonded with him as well. But more on that later…. We passed by a lot of weird trees, growing in patterns that really didn’t make much sense. I mean, one or two weird trees is one thing. There were weird trees EVERYWHERE! Seemingly growing away from the sun, in arcs, in zig zags. Then we found a mushroom. Alex said to eat it, but just a small piece, because it’s really spicy. What does a solo female traveler do when she’s in a dark forest alone with some guy from Romania she just met an hour ago? Break off a piece and try it! At first, it just tasted like mushroom. But the more I chewed, the more hot peppery tasting it got. So unexpected. Not quite like termites in Belize that tasted exactly like carrots, but interesting none the less! 😋
The “harp” tree
A knot that looks like a face
Peppery!!
Probably the strangest plant phenomenon though was the twisted trees- trees that were literally growing in a spiral. And they were scattered throughout the forest, not just in one place. Of course the paranormal explanation is that its the energy from the spirits or whatever. But there must be a more reasonable explanation. I asked Alex if this was confined to a particular species of tree (that would make sense- genetics!). No. Multiple species exhibit it. Hmmmm. Weird. And it’s most likely not a genetic reason either, because the last picture shows two trees growing out of the same trunk- one completely spiraled, with the most spiraling I had seen on any of the trees, and the other perfectly straight. Explain that shit!! I told him that he had this wonderful botanical department at the university! They needed to come out here and figure it out! He said he had contacted them. They refused to get involved. This place creeps people out and they don’t want to be associated with it. C’mon, Romanian botanists! You’re better than that!!!
Another weird phenomenon we saw more than once was branches that grew down to the ground. That’s right- branches from up above where you couldn’t even reach them would grow straight down to the ground. That makes NO sense!! Plants have hormones that cause them to grow toward the light, not away from it! And the forest wasn’t super crowded with trees, so they weren’t really having to compete for space. This one hit the ground and then instead of growing back up, started growing ALONG the ground. Mind. Boggled.
So the scientist in me was having way more fun in this forest than the paranormal in me. I was fixated on these trees and trying to come up with rational explanations for what I was seeing. It was getting darker and darker, but my eyes adjusted to the light pretty well and I declined use of a flashlight. I had honestly completely forgotten about anything paranormal in my curiosity for these trees. Alex and I were standing there talking about how he, a former physics major, created this business- a topic that I LOVE because I am so passionate about entrepreneurship and really enjoy hearing how people turn their passions into businesses. I could not have had paranormal thoughts further away from my mind. And then, I felt something. It was straight ahead of us on the path, maybe 50 meters up. I couldn’t even see that far, it was too dark, but I could feel exactly where it was. I continued listening to Alex, and then we started walking- toward whatever I was still feeling. I really didn’t want to say anything. Again, this isn’t something I enjoy, and I was having more fun talking about botany and business than boogey-men. Whatever it was wasn’t moving as we approached. But it wasn’t a “person” spirit (don’t ask me how I know, I just know). It was more of an energy, not a spirit. We got closer and closer, and then we walked right through it. I could feel it. I was kind of….I don’t know….crackly- like electricity. But not like electric. Maybe more like that feeling in the air when it’s about to lightening or something. The weather was cloudy, but no storms. We passed through it, and it still didn’t move. It was right in the middle of the path, and maybe covered a diameter (although it wasn’t a perfect circle, I don’t know the shape) of about 4-5 feet. It didn’t feel like a good energy. It didn’t feel like a bad energy. It was completely neutral. Just….energy. As we kept walking, I could now feel it behind me, in the same place as we moved further away.
While we were talking, I snapped a picture toward what I was feeling without saying why. I don’t see anything on the photo, but I wasn’t really expecting to.
Alex was still talking about his business, and I finally had to interrupt him. I told him what I felt. He seemed kind of uncomfortable and said it scared him (which seems weird for a guy who gives tours in a haunted forest!!). I could tell he really didn’t want to talk about it. Ok. 😕 We continued on for a ways, and then turned off of the path and just started walking across the forest floor. We weren’t 3 steps off the path when I felt the energy right on us (we had probably gone 100 meters or so from where it had been). And now it had a feeling. A protective feeling. I got the feeling that it was very protective of Alex and it really didn’t want us to go off of the path. Still, not a “person” feeling to it, like a ghost. Just an energy that was exuding this feeling. I really didn’t want to tell Alex, so I waited until we were almost out of the forest and then told him. I could tell that he still really didn’t want to hear about it, so I dropped it.
The moon was full and shining off of the clouds over the suburbs of Cluj as we emerged from the forest, about 3 hours after we had entered. I don’t know what that was in there. It didn’t scare me at all. It just was.
A few months ago, I never even had Romania on my travel radar. There was a cheap flight from Rome to Bucharest and I needed somewhere kind of inexpensive to spend 10 days before my Switzerland housesit. So, Romania it was! Just like with Hoia Baciu, I came into this country with no expectations. I just went with it. And it never ceased to amaze me at practically every turn! 10 days and I only covered a tiny portion of the country between Bucharest and Cluj-Napoca. But boy, was there a LOT to see!! However, there’s still much, much more to see. Romania is one of those up and coming tourist spots- kind of off the radar now, but it’s starting to get into the sights of many travelers. There’s good and bad to that… Whereas Iceland and Scotland and Ireland have multiple HUGE facebook groups dedicated to traveling there, Romania only has a few, and they aren’t very large. My favorite is Romania Travel, run by Oana. I foresee that group growing and growing in the near future, as travelers learn of the treasure that is Romania, and begin flocking there for more information. I’m glad I beat the flock. I’m glad there was a cheap flight from Rome. I’m glad I chose Romania.
Another day, another plane! We got up at 6, made a pizza for breakfast, packed up, and headed out. Time to say goodbye to Malta. 🙁 Easy trip to the airport, parked the car, dropped the keys, breezed through security, and got to our gate. Boarded my last Ryan air flight of this trip, and am happy to say that my carry on (the big one that is a bit oversize and a few kg over weight) made it on yet again with no issues! Whew! So glad I bought priority boarding for all my budget flights. I think that helps them to look the other way. 😏
Airbnb ($65 a night for our own little apartment next to the metro!) check in was at 3, but I told the host we were landing at 1030, so she graciously agreed to a 1230 check in so we could drop our bags. The train from the airport to Termini station was 14 euros each and a half hour trip. From there, we walked the little over half mile to the bnb. Checked in, dropped our bags, and hit the street for FOOD! Ok. Here’s how lame I am. I’ve really been wanting fried chicken (lame when in Italy, yes, but it’s the result of weeks of peanut butter sandwiches!!). Darling Brian saw a chicken place on our walk to the bnb, so we headed back there and had fast food halal chicken, about 2 steps down from KFC, but worth it. 🍗 Sometimes, it’s the little comforts when you’ve been traveling for weeks on end…
We had a tour scheduled for 6pm, which gave us about 5 hours to cram in as much Rome as we could. We really only had a day and a half here. Why the heck such a short time? Because flights back to Los Angeles for Brian were cheapest from Rome, so it made better sense to fly to Rome from Malta, then to LA. Plus, I got a cheap flight to Romania out of there as well, so win-win. I had spent several days in Rome last year, so I had done the major “must sees”. Brian and I were going to fill in the gaps. But there are some things that MUST be done “when in Rome”. First up, Brian HAD to be able to cross off The Vatican as a country on his Been app. He had no interest in the Sistene Chapel or any of that (and I had done it last year), so we literally hopped the metro, walked to the Vatican, got within the walls, and Brian checked off his app. I asked him if he wanted a pope magnet? A pope necklace? A pope keychain? A pope soap on a rope? Pope nope was his response to each. 😝 See that line of people? All standing in heat that is a degree or two less than hell itself to get into the Vatican. Last year, I bought early entrance, skip the line. It’s the only way to go. You couldn’t pay me to stand in that line… We did get one souvenir from the Vatican- a free water bottle refill…(now, with holy water! 😇) I love all of the fountains around Rome…
Ah, the Vatican. So humble. Just like the story of Jesus riding into Jerusalem in a Bugatti to stay at his 50,000 square foot gilded palace for the weekend… Keep tithing, Catholics! It’s for Jesus!
We didn’t burst into flames upon drinking it. We deem it #heathensafe
Next, we crossed the Tiber River and walked through the city to the Piazza Navona, with it’s beautiful water fountains. This is another of my “been there, done that” moments, but it was still fun to show it to Brian for the first time!
Wound our way around to the Pantheon. Another “biggie” that I checked off last year. And frankly, the one site that really upset me. This was built by the ROMANS. It is AMAZING. But oh no, the unoriginal Christians had to jump in there and turn it into some shrine for saints. Like damn kids who just HAVE to mess with wet cement….I find it revolting and blasphemous to history. Do not get me started on this place… 😡
Look at that gorgeous original Roman brick- standing for over 1900 years…
The Pantheon…a ROMAN TEMPLE. Roman.
Ancient Christian graffiti artists painting over gorgeous original Roman brick…
More walking and gawking. When you’re in Rome, it is imperative that you look down every single narrow street, because you never know what you might find! Like this Roman building incorporated into a “modern” structure. GORGEOUS! Or just a pile of amazing Roman ruins, waiting there like they’re waiting for the empire to rise again and restore them to their former glory…
It was super hot, and about a mile back to the bnb. We decided to take the bus. Not sure who the Roman God of public transportation is, but he/she was apparently displeased with us. The bus pulled in, and we got on. It was jam. packed. Like could not move. We didn’t even make it past the place where the driver was sitting, and a bunch of people got on right behind us. I was trying not to freak out. I could do this for 10 stops. Really. Until at the next stop where no one got off and more people crammed in- to the point that the doors could barely close. What the fuck?! It was so hot, you could barely breathe. People were crammed so close together that you couldn’t move. My claustrophobia isn’t terrible, but it exists, and it was taking all of my willpower to have an anxiety attack. Brian was trying to reassure me. Finally, we got to the Colosseum stop, and just like I thought, a ton of people piled off. We were able to sit down. I will NEVER take a bus in Rome again. Ever.
Chilled at the bnb for a bit, then headed out on the metro to meet up with our tour for the evening. This was something a little different- a tour of the Capuchin Monastery bone crypt and the Priscilla Catacombs with Walks of Italy. Our guide was Melanie. And from the get go, I knew she was gooood. You could feel the passion for the history emanating off of her, and I was soaking it in! Now, the bad news- we couldn’t take pictures in either of these places because the church wants to make money and have you buy photos in the souvenir shop wants you to respect the dead. Good old Christian hypocrisy at its best. Normally, I would take pictures anyway, because if you are selling pictures, it has NOTHING to do with respect. If you don’t respect the dead, why should I? (And why should dead people be respected anyway? It’s not like they care…). However, I did respect Melanie, and didn’t want her getting into trouble. So I didn’t even try to sneak one. That said, let’s “dig in” to the history of these two places (grave pun 🙃 ), and I’ll use other pictures from off the internet so you can see what I’m talking about.
First up, the Capuchin Monastery. Melanie wove the history of these monks in a way that had me completely captivated. A lot of times I’m super interested in a tour. Rarely am I CAPTIVATED. That, my friends, is the difference between knowledge and passion. Ok, so let me try to recap this history in a nutshell… There were all of these Franciscan monks, who were supposed to be all pious and humble and taking care of the poor and shit. Oh, and chaste. Most of them decided those rules were more like “suggestions”, so they tended to take the opposite approach. #typical One group of Franciscans in the 1500s though were firm believers in the rules, and they were kinda making the rest of the Franciscans look bad… So the naughty Franciscans, who were moved and humbled by these other monks, decided to turn their lives around and rededicate themselves to the tenants of their order. Oh wait, that’s not what happened. They persecuted the monks who were doing what they were supposed to be doing and forced them to go into hiding. The persecuted monks added a hood to their robes- called a cappuccio (see where we’re going here??). A few years later, they got permission from the pope to travel and preach to the poor. And the order of the Capuchin monks was born. They lived in serious squalor, but that was one of their rules. However, some biggity wiggity that I forget his name came to power in Rome and was kin to one of the biggity wiggity Capuchins, and didn’t want them living in such a horrible run down church (more because it made him look bad than concern for the conditions). So he gave them another place to live. This place we were visiting today.
One little problem…the Capuchins had been burying their dead under their old church (the one that didn’t exit through the gift shop) for about 100 years. So they packed up what paltry possessions they had, and still had a lot of space in their carry on (this was before Ryan Air). So they dug up their fellow monks (THOUSANDS of them), and brought them with, sticking them in the crypts below their new home. And then one day, they got bored or something (no wifi). Someone decided to go down there and arrange the bones. Like pin them to the ceilings and make chandeliers out of them and shit. Vows of poverty do weird things to you…I vow never to be impoverished! And the famous Capuchin crypts were born. The monks come down here to walk, reflect, and pray each evening- as a reminder that life is short. In fact, there’s an inscription… “What you are now, we once were; what we are now, you shall be.” Lovely. Ok, now that you have the 411, here are the pics… It really isn’t as creepy in person.
Out of the crypt, into the catacomb! We all piled into a van and headed off to the next location- the Priscilla Catacombs. Different place, same story. No photos. You have to respect the dead by buying pictures inside of the gift shop, because Jesus. Oy with you Christians… 🙄 So pics aren’t mine. Ok, history lesson time! Ancient Romans cremated their dead. When Christianity came be-bopping along, they were against cremation. After all, you needed that body for the resurrection (frankly, I’d prefer a new body with a smaller butt and better knees for eternity, but whatevz). So the catacombs were born- a series of burial chambers built outside of the city walls. This particular one is about 8 miles of tunnels!! On either side of the tunnel, there are ledges carved into the walls where the bodies would be placed. They’d dig your ledge to fit your body. The catacombs were raided over the centuries, so when they were rediscovered in the 1800s and archaeologists started doing their thing, a lot of destruction had taken place. Bones were strewn everywhere. Remember how adamant these Catholics are about respecting the dead by not taking pictures? Well, yeah…tell that to the pope. Because a massive amount of this destruction was caused in the 1600s when not one but TWO popes sent down treasure hunters. Yeah, now that I think about it, I do remember reading in the Bible that, “He who robs and desecrates the dead shall be blessed with riches, but he who takes a photograph shall be damned for eternity.” Have I mentioned oy with you Christians yet?? 🙄🙄
The archaeologists have cleaned up the catacombs. The vast majority of the ledges are now emptied- the bones stored somewhere down here inaccessible to the public. But ledges where dead people once were aren’t the main draw down here…it’s art. Some of the oldest Christian art in the WORLD! Let’s look at two of them….
This one is the oldest known image of Mary and Jesus, dating back to about 150!!!!!!! WOW!!!!!
And this one is probably the oldest painting in the world of the Annunciation (when the angel told Mary her EPT test would be coming out positive).
Soon we were out of the catacombs and back to the land of the living. I can not recommend this tour enough!!!!! Seriously, between the Sistine Chapel/Vatican Museum tour and Coloseum/Forum tour I did last year, this is BY FAR my favorite. And that is 100% because of Melanie. Book with Walks of Italy and ASK FOR MELANIE BY NAME. You will get a guide who admittedly geeks out over this stuff!! Brian said that she reminded him of me- how I get all animated when I’m talking about this kind of stuff. It’s called passion. And it’s what makes a good tour a GREAT tour!!
As we were leaving, I told Brian I really wanted to talk to her about teaching for my school. No sooner were the words out of my mouth, than she started talking to someone next to her (our audio was still on) about making money doing this kind of thing, how it’s her passion, how she TRAINS (aka TEACHES) other guides in the off season….everything I needed to hear to go from tentatively considering approaching her to knowing this was fate! We had a nice conversation. I hope to bring her on board next year! We asked her for a restaurant suggestion. And speaking of fate, she gave us one. I never split one day up into 2 journals, but what happened next deserves its own entry…
So usually I like to journal one day at a time (great, now I’ll have that tune stuck in my head…). But this one deserves its own post. Last post, I left off at asking our fab tour guide, Melanie, for a restaurant suggestion. We wanted something cozy and romantic, as it would be our big “fancy Rome dinner” outing (no, fast food halal fried chicken for lunch was NOT our one big meal for the trip!!). She suggested a place called Café Propaganda that she likes near the Colosseum. We headed out on foot.
I hadn’t gone to the Colosseum at night last year, and wow, but it was spectacular!!
We walked to Café Propaganda, which was right behind the Colosseum. Got a table for two and perused the menu. The prices were actually quite reasonable! And so cute inside- just what we were looking for! And with a French flair, to boot! We had literally gone through probably 3 dozen or more listings on Google and couldn’t find anything we liked, which is why we asked Melanie…
Brian ordered wine, and I, being the bastion of European culture that I am, ordered water. Still, not fizzy. Because I’m couth like that. And wine is icky-poo. Then they surprised us with these free little appetizer things that looked like tomatoes, but weren’t. Just designed to look like them. Of course, Brian had to pause because he doesn’t like tomatoes….Oy. They were really cheese with some kind of red stuff on the outside, and a sprig of basel. OH. MY. GOD. Um, I’ll take 2 dozen to go. Brian, you want any?? Whatever cheese that was, and I have no idea, it was deeeeelicious.
We ordered an appetizer of Eggplant Parmigiana. I had to coax Brian into that one, because he’s convinced he doesn’t like eggplant (just like he was convinced 2.5 years ago that he didn’t like asparagus, now he eats it every time it’s on sale…men….). In the meantime, they brought us 3 types of bread on a little wooden tray. Holy. Freaking. Moly. They were GOOD! Then, our eggplant. Um, I’m not sure I’ve ever had anything that good in my life!!!! It was AMAZING!!! I wanted a whole bucket of it! I wanted to lick the plate (Brian barely talked me out of it). And even Mr. Picky Veggie declared it delicious!!
Now it was time to wait for our entrees. We were sitting there talking, and then things get kind of blurry. I’ll do my best here. So we’re sitting there talking, and he puts his elbows on the table and reaches his hands toward mine. I take his hands. This isn’t anything out of the ordinary. Then he says something like, “If we’re going to do this we need a ring.”, and proceeds to put an AWESOME octopus tentacle ring on my right ring finger. Ok, now I’m confused. Words aren’t matching actions. We did the octopus ring thing (different type of ring) at a castle in France a couple of years ago, and that was just a ring for Christmas, on my right hand. Was this a repeat? What was happening? Everything was foggy. So, typical black and white, get to the point, logical me blurts out, “Are you asking me to marry you?”. That was an affirmative! OMG! And I’m not even #knockedup!!! I told him WRONG FINGER and moved it to my left hand. So hypothetically, I think I’m engaged to myself now… What you have to understand is that this is so us. Dorky. Awkward. Unconventional. Seriously lacking in seriousness. In other words, the perfect proposal! And did I mention it’s on Friday, July 13?? What could POSSIBLY go wrong?! 😛
Brian and I have been talking about getting married for a while now. I remember the first time it even popped in my head was shortly after we got together and I was in France. I was in the Musee de Beaux Arts in Lille, and there was a thing where you could write wishes on a wall. I don’t even know where it came from, but I wrote that I would want to marry Brian. That is TOTALLY not me. And then, when I went to London right after that, and was in the garden of King Henry VIII’s castle, there were these trees that I thought would be perfect to marry Brian under- very Alice in Wonderlandesque. Of course, Henry VIII’s court probably isn’t the best place for wedding planning….but I digress.
Now, for the super weird part. Two nights before this, I had a dream that we were getting married and could not find a place for the ceremony. We were searching all over the world. This is not something I have dreams about. But it was real enough that I mentioned it to Brian the next morning, and even brought it up a few more times over the next couple of days. Was I having a premonition? Was Brian giving off wedding vibes that I was picking up on? Hmmmmmm….🤔
Oh yeah! Food!! The main dishes came. I got Carbonara melted tortello with pecorino cheese and salted zabaglione mousse. That’s how cultured I am. Or….Melanie had mentioned pecorino cheese was a very local thing, I saw it, and ordered it. One of those. Brian got homemade potatoes gnocchi with clams, asparagus (yeah, that veggie he was convinced he hated 2.5 years ago…) and saffron. God damn, but we are FANCY!! And it was GOOD! And honest to god, each of those entrees were like $20 each. Which really is not bad at all.
So, I reckon we’re hitched. And we’re both excited about it! Thank god his pickiness only extends to food and not women! 😜 The only regret I have is that we didn’t tell the waiter what had happened! We might have gotten a free dessert or something!!!! #alwaysacheapass And that, my friends, is the moment that I turned into one of THOSE girls. Holy crap. I have a natural inclination toward planning (which is why I’m such a good traveler!), so wedding planning snapped into place! We decided on a travel themed wedding. That was about it before he had to go back home. Left to myself and my own devices over the past several days, I have managed to figure out rings, the venue (our home after we finish the remodel- no need to search the entire world like in my dream!), looking at dress ideas (the fact that EVERYWHERE I TURN there is a wedding dress doesn’t help, as you will see on upcoming blogs), and music to walk in to and walk out to. One of THOSE girls. #cringe This, from a chick who never gave a ding dong damn about any of that stuff before, shunned the very idea, etc… We’re still 1-2 years out from anything happening. We still have to get the blessing of a tax attorney and accountant. If they say “nope, not financially beneficial”, then we’ll just do a commitment ceremony. We don’t need a piece of paper. And whatever we’ll do, we’ll do on the cheap. And I mean CHEAP. We are not ones to go blowing a bunch of money on such things. Except the honeymoon- because money is for TRAVELING!!!! Oh, who I am fooling. I’ll have us in some $17 a night hostel somewhere eating peanut butter sandwiches. But, since it’s our honeymoon, I’ll let him splurge on honey to put on his. He likes that. That is true love. 💞
And now I present to you, the latest in the “Mary feels like crap while traveling the world” series….sigh.
Yes, it’s only Day 2, but it’s already our last day in Rome! Woke up and headed out as engaged peoples instead of just boyfriend and girlfriend at about 9am. 😍 We had a few things on our list to get done this morning before our tour of the Colosseum and Forum at 1:40. The plan was to get everything done, do our 2.5 hour tour, then come back and relax for the rest of afternoon/evening.
The day started out great! One of the things on our list, the Alchemy Gate, was in a park literally across the street from our bnb! I bet you’ve never even heard of this place. That’s why we were there. 🙂 Here’s the story. There was a villa here in the 1600s. This “gate” (more like a door) was one of the 5 entrances, with the other 4 now gone. The owner of the villa was very interested in alchemy (basically turning things into gold). An alchemist visited the villa, and said that he had the recipe to turn herbs into gold. The next morning, the alchemist was gone, but he left two things behind- some gold flakes that were “proof” of his abilities, and the recipe. Except the recipe was written in undecipherable symbols. The villa owner then constructed this gate in 1680, and inscribed the recipe on the door. The hope was that some passerby would see it, understand it, and translate it so more herbs could be turned to gold! Fun story!! Where the gate is, there are also Roman ruins from the 200s. I mean, c’mon, Rome! Could you get any cooler! Oh, and did I mention it’s all behind a fence and guarded by dozens of cats, all of which give you the dirtiest looks when you walk by or dare to speak to them…
I’m a bad ass cat, just hanging out on some ancient Roman columns. And by the way, fuck you.
From there, we walked to the Spanish Steps, which I didn’t see last time I was here. That was about 1.5 miles, and “eh”. It’s just a bunch of stairs. With about 50 tourists for every stair. Brian snapped a couple of pics. And I realized when I downloaded them that he took pictures of everything there EXCEPT the steps!! This is what happens when I hand over the camera…. So here I present you with “random things you can find AROUND the Spanish steps”. 🙄
Ok, I gotta hand it to Brian on this one. This looks a lot like my Sun King’s symbol, so I’m assuming that’s why he took it!
I looked at the map and decided we could walk up toward the park that is behind the steps. Another half mile or so. We got to the park, it was now well after 10am, we had gone over 2 miles in the heat, and not had anything to eat. Food was now a PRIORITY! We passed the National French Academy, and of course I had to google to see what it was. Apparently, it was founded by Louis XIV (my Sun King!!) to send French artists to Rome to study and for inspiration. They live at the academy for a year. Apparently you could go inside, but we are both a little “eh” about art unless it’s something super duper spectacular, so we continued up the hill in search of food…
Here is what I learned about Italy that day. They don’t believe in breakfast. Hardly anything was open. If something was open, it was all pastries, because Italians don’t believe in protein before 11:30am. I think it’s a papal decree or something. At this point, I’m getting antsy, because I do not function well on lots of walking, heat, and no protein. I have to have my morning protein, or things get ugly fast!! We strolled hand in hand in the beautiful park, while I started having an anxiety issue about food….. Walked through the ancient Roman wall back into the city and found food alright….like 40 euros for breakfast!!! WTF?? I want protein, not a home equity loan!! Apparently we had stumbled into the fancy schmancy part of town…
Brian googled for a breakfast place and found one. We hoofed it another half mile. It didn’t exist. There was nothing but pastries. My body was tired and I was getting a gnarly headache. We decided to just walk toward our next stop, and hope we’d stumble upon food somewhere along the way… We’re up to like 4 miles at this point.
Next stop was to go see the “immaculate” body of Saint Victoria at the Santa Maria della Vittoria church. I may or may not have suggested I would take a few nibbles off of said 1800 year old body…. I did take control of the camera at this point, because weird ass creepy shit is my specialty and I didn’t want Brian fucking it up (this was even before I knew about the Spanish Steps debacle) The church was pretty unassuming from the outside. Inside, it was kind of dark, very decorated, organ music quietly playing- it was all an air of some sort of spirituality- not “hey, we’re a super gaudy church- exit through the gift shop!” vibe like most have. Found the body. Oh for Christ’s sake. It looked like a mannequin. If I had bitten into that dumb thing, it would have been like biting into a candle. And probably not even a good one like Yankee. Those teefers are real, and the true miracle would have been braces for that poor soul. Fake skin, fake hair, fake eyes. Common denominator? Fake. Draw your own conclusions… That said, why are Catholics so freaking morbid? Shudder.
At this point, it’s 11:30, we’ve walked about 4 miles total on zero food, and my body is in full blown rebellion. It’s either get food, or lay down in the street and die. I wasn’t going any further. Thankfully, Italians finally can serve protein after 11:30, but it’s still hard to come by. Dear Italy, Woman cannot live on carbs alone. Love, Mary. Found a pizza-ish place where you could buy just a slice. There was one with prosciutto and fig on it that looked unique, so I went for that. Pretty good! I thought I would immediately feel better. I thought wrong….
Trevi Fountain was up next. It was a little over a mile from where we were. I checked the Uber rates. 10 euros. I couldn’t bring myself to do it. I should have. We started walking, and I was feeling worse and worse. It was a combination of the heat, not enough protein, a massive headache (that I would have taken an aspirin for if I had had one- that’s a big deal for me because I don’t take pills unless it’s a serious situation), my stomach not being happy, my muscles being tired, my brain being foggy….I was a mess. But we got to the fountain. I had already seen it, so pics are Brian’s.
Brian led us what seemed like 10 miles through the hot streets and got us to the Colosseo metro station where we were to meet our guide. We were about 20 minutes early. I needed a restroom STAT. The guide said we could go to a bar that was through the metro station and upstairs. I will say- Iceland, Scotland, Ireland, Malta- you could find public restrooms. Apparently there’s another papel decree that Rome can’t offer such things. But hey, they’ll give you all the free water you can drink, so… 😊 Brian ordered gelato while I went to the bathroom. He was still trying to figure it out when I got back, so I just sat down at a table to rest my weary, rapidly declining self. So, if you order gelato, you can’t sit at a table. Holy fuck. Brian walks over to hand me mine so we can go, and gets griped at by the guy that we can’t sit there with gelato. Yeah, dude, we fucking got it. Can he god damned HAND me mine so we can leave, because he’s juggling 2 gelatos and a fruit cup???? Sheesh.
I was feeling a little better after sitting for a few minutes and getting some cold gelato and fruit into my system. Went back and found the tour guide, and I sat on a dirty sidewalk trying to maintain my strength. Soon it was time to go. So let me stop here and explain this tour. Last summer, my son, his girlfriend, and I took this same tour with Walks of Italy- the same outfit we did the catacombs tour with yesterday. This is the skip-the-line, arena floor, underground, and Forum tour. I wanted Brian to get access to all of those places, because I knew we’d never come back again and it needs to be seen. Well, because we didn’t plan everything ahead of time like we should, it was literally about 4 days before that I got around to finding a tour. And EVERYTHING was booked solid. I just so happened to find this one tour through Get Your Guide, so I snapped it up. The operator was Touriks. They ain’t no Walks of Italy…
We walk to the far side of the Colosseum (kind of the back side), and go in. We then have to stand in the sun for like 10 minutes while we are handed off to another tour guide and got our audio sets. All of the recovery I had made from sitting and eating melted in the heat. It was 95 out. I was trying to drink as much water as I could, but fear of there never being any bathrooms was in my mind. I sat while the guide got everything sorted. Finally, we were off and into the shade. I had to immediately sit. My body was giving out fast, and we were only about 15 minutes into 2.5 hours… As the guide talked, I immediately recognized that she was not very good. She repeated herself constantly. Her stories didn’t flow. The woman from Walks of Italy last year was AMAZING!!! She really knew her stuff. She was passionate about it and explained everything in a way that got you excited about it as well. This woman…ugh. I thought maybe it was because I felt bad and was just critical of the entire universe right now. But as we moved to the next stop, Brian confirmed that he wasn’t digging her either.
Next stop, on the arena floor, in the full sun and heat. I sat on the benches while the guide explained how the floor was covered in sand and asked why. I piped up, “To soak up the blood.” Yep. And that was the extent of my interactive Hermione self for the day…. Next we went underground, which really is the coolest (literally and figuratively!) part of the Colosseum. I immediately sat on a cold rock and even took off my shoes and put my bare feet against the cold stones, trying to release heat from my body. This was my favorite part of the Colosseum last year- to see where the animals were kept, to see how they used elevators 2000 years ago to move them from the underground area to the arena floors. It really is spectacular.
Standing on the arena floor. There’s only part of it there now, but all of this underground used to be covered
Trap doors in the arena floor where animals would randomly pop up- surprising the gladiators and thrilling the audience!
There is still some marble left from the VIP seating area
View from the underground- kind of the “backstage” area. This is where the animals were kept.
Replica of the elevator system that would move the animals from underground to those trap doors in the arena floor
From there, we had to go to the upper levels, and I remembered that that meant a lot of stairs. I was NOT feeling stairs. The guide asked if anyone wanted to use the elevator. She didn’t have to ask me twice. So me, and an old lady with mobility issues, boarded the elevator. I’d rather be embarrassed than passed out… Up here, more sun. I sat while she explained everything, 60% of which was a repeat from what she had already said. It was frustrating as hell to pay this much money for this poor of a guide. By this time, even Brian was making fun of her constantly saying, “Can you imagine??” and “This is just the skeleton of the Colosseum.” And telling the story over and over of the “colossal” statue of Nero, over 35 meters high. UGH! She walked us right past the water fountain and didn’t even ask if anyone needed water, even though it was 95 today. The guide last year made sure to stop and let us fill our bottles. At this point, I’m just thinking ahead to the Forum tour, and having to climb Palatine hill….
View from the “cheap seats”!
Finally, it was over. We were supposed to go to the exit and meet the guide at 3pm. We had 10 minutes. I HAD to have water. So we backtracked to the fountain, filled up, then had to backtrack back to the exit. Got down there and found the original guide that we met. Where we were promptly pawned off on ANOTHER guide. We had the same guide for the entire time last year…. I pulled her aside, explained that I wasn’t feeling well and didn’t want to climb Palatine hill and I’d wait at the bottom. I knew they came down the same path again to get into the forum. So we entered the forum (which I love more than the Colosseum- it’s just STUNNING!!), and I found a bench under a tree near a water fountain to sit at for the next hour. Palatine Hill overlooks the Forum, and was where the emperors lived.
They came back, and the tour was basically over. She showed us some pictures in a book that showed the forum buildings and how they looked 2000 years ago compared to today. And that was it. Last year, the guide took us into the Forum to explain things. We were now on our own to explore the forum. Brian starts heading for the exit and I inform him NO WAY. He is going to see this. We’re just going to walk slow. We walked through the ruins, marveling at how advanced this city was. At just how spectacular the buildings were. I can’t even imagine how impressive they were in their hey day… The Forum was the “heart” of the city- lots of temples, government buildings, and commercial/social venues. When we were done, the plan was to walk back to Colosseo metro and take the subway back to the airbnb. But I was too tired. I called an Uber. For only 7 euros more than the subway, door to door service was worth it.
View of the forum from Palatine Hill
Got there and grabbed some food at a café that was downstairs in our building and took it to our room. Then, we packed our bags, me giving Brian all of my winter stuff, making my bag MUCH lighter and easier to manage, and his MUCH heavier! We were both asleep by 6:30. I slept STRAIGHT THROUGH until the alarm went off at 4:45am. 10 hours. Holy crap. My body was just exhausted from all of this fast travel. Brian didn’t sleep as well, but he never does…
I woke up early in Antibes, France. Really early. 4:30am. Because I had a flight to Malta leaving at 7am! Got my things together, gave Molly the ferret a kiss goodbye, and headed out the door to my Uber. Now, Uber is not my first choice. In fact, I had already purchased the return bus ticket to the airport. But I didn’t realize when I did that that it doesn’t start running until 6:30. The train starts up at 5:10, but there’s a long walk to the airport from the train terminal, and I really had no interest in trying to navigate that with my pack in the dark. So Uber it was. And Uber at a 2.4x rate, at that. Kill me now. We will never discuss what that fucking Uber cost me, but let’s just say that it was as much as my flight to Malta…I’m not kidding.
Got to the airport and breezed through security, and got to my Easy Jet gate. Had an entire exit row to myself, so I could lay down and try to sleep on the 2 hour flight. Apparently there aren’t a lot of people in Nice terribly excited about flying to Catania, Sicily at 7am on a Monday morning…
Landed in Catania, and settled in for the long haul. A 7, yes 7 hour layover. I considered leaving the airport and exploring the city, but by the time I would have had to deal with finding a place to store my luggage (no way I was carrying it around with me), get to the city, figure out what to do, get back, get my luggage, get through security…I decided it just wasn’t worth it. So I got a piece of pizza (when in Italy!), sat on the floor, and tried to entertain myself on my phone for 7….long….hours….
Finally, it was time to board Ryan Air to Malta! And if Malta in and of itself wasn’t exciting enough…BRIAN WAS IN THE AIR ON HIS WAY TO BARCELONA TO CONNECT TO A FLIGHT TO MALTA AND MEET ME THERE!!!! YAY!!! #internationallove We have both decided that 5 weeks is a ridiculous amount of time not to see each other, and from now on, he’s going to come and visit me every 3 weeks on my long trips instead of just one time in the middle. 🙂 He wuvs me. 😍 Short hour long flight and landed.
Again, didn’t feel like dealing with a damn bus, especially when I wasn’t even sure exactly which bus stop was closest to the airbnb, so paid a cab 27 euro. At least I didn’t have to negotiate- you go to the little taxi desk, tell them the destination, and they tell you how much and assign you a cab. Nice. But seriously, I should have been given a 50 euro refund… The guy had no clue where we were going. None. He weaved in and out of narrow winding streets for what seemed like forever. After I realized he was lost, I asked him if he wanted to call my AirBNB host. Nope. Ok…so we drove around some more. I was texting the host, asking him questions about cross streets or landmarks or anything. The driver had no clue what any of them were. Finally, I convinced him to call the host. He did. Wow! I didn’t realize Maltese was such an aggressive sounding language! Interesting! We drove and drove some more. The cab driver rolled down his window and asked some other driver something in Maltese. We made U turns. We turned into dead ends and had to back up. I was getting urpy in the backseat and if this Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride from hell didn’t end soon, the driver was going to be lost AND have a mess to deal with (the sign that said 50 euro cleaning fee was really the only thing keeping me from puking)…I finally convinced him to call the host again. After they hung up, the driver said the host was coming to get us. Jesus! What crazy off the beaten path, remote, rural place had I booked? Oh, just one on a freaking busy main street of a bay… The host was PISSED at the driver (Maltese apparently isn’t an aggressive language unless one of the parties is calling the other stupid…). The driver was PISSED. I was just happy to be out of that damn cab! The host showed me to the private apartment Brian and I would be calling home for the next few days. It was perfect, and the view of St. Paul’s Bay from the balcony was spectacular!
So I got in about 5 hours before Brian. After that crazy ass cab ride, I figured Brian would need moral and navigational support getting here, so I decided to meet him at the airport. Plus, I just wanted to see him sooner! ☺ No way in hell did I want to take another cab back to the airport- both for my sanity’s sake and my pocketbook’s. So I looked up the bus schedule online, and saw that the direct X1 bus would leave from just on the other side of the bay (super short walk) and take about an hour to get to the airport- arriving at the exact time Brian would. 3 euros. ❤ing it!! Headed down there with a bit of time to spare. Walked into the convenience store just to see if they by chance had Dr. Pepper. SCORE!!
I stood by the bus stop, sipping my Dr. Pepper like the boss lady traveler I am, counting down the minutes until my man arrived! Saw the X1 bus coming, pulled my 3 euros out of my pocket where they had been stashed separately for efficiency, walked up to the curb….and watched the driver literally look me straight in the eye and keep going. MOTHER FUCKER!!!!!!! Now what?! I looked at my phone. It was almost 8:40. Brian lands at 9:40, except I knew he was a little late leaving Barcelona. There were no other buses that would get me there before 10:30 though, and I had to make a connection (which is not something I was interested in doing in the dark when I had no clue where I was). So here we fucking go, cab #3 of the day. I came back to the house and called the cab guy the owner had recommended in his welcome guide. That guy said he couldn’t do it. FUCK! So I jumped online and searched for an alternative. There is no uber in Malta. Found something called Ecabs that I could book online. Rate was 24 euros and they said they’d be here in 10 minutes….we’d see… Sure enough, I got a text that they were arriving, went downstairs, and there was the guy! Super nice car, and as a bonus, he actually knew how to find his way to the airport on his first try!! Highly recommended.
Got to the airport, and Brian was only delayed by like 15 minutes. I started looking around for the car rental people. They were recommended by the airbnb host (I read about 9 quadzillon horror stories about rental cars in Malta and wanted to make sure I didn’t get screwed!). Percius Car Hire was going to meet us there at the airport with a sign to turn over our car (169 euros for 4 days, including airport drop off fees and full insurance). But they weren’t there… We walked back through the “welcome line” at the arrival gate a couple of times. Then went outside to look. Came back and walked the line one more time and found the lady. She was super nice and it was really easy to deal with the paperwork. Had our keys in no time and were rolling out of the parking lot into the Maltese night….
Let me tell you something about my boyfriend, Brian. This man can drive on the left side of the road like he’s been doing it all his life. Actually, since I’ve been gone he got his DNA test back and found out he’s 73% English, so that probably explains it. The first time he did it, we were in Borneo. No problem. 2nd time, South Africa. No problem. Now I figured it was time for a challenge, so I booked a manual!! #cheapass So he’s coming off about 17 hours of traveling, driving in the dark (which we never do), and shifting with his left hand. Like. A. Champ. Damn, I love that man! With me navigating, we actually managed to find the airbnb again. Good thing, because we had a brand new country to explore tomorrow!!
Ok. So normally we are super prepared and have our trips planned out really well. This trip, I had 10 countries and 2.5 months to plan for- the vast majority of that solo, so the time that we had together kind of went on the back burner…I had to make sure all of my solo stuff was taken care of (it still isn’t, Switzerland, I’m looking at you). When I arrived yesterday, I did some quick research, pulled info from some of the links we had thrown into Malta tab on the massive Europe spreadsheet (that spreadsheet that normally lists each day’s detailed itinerary….) and started plotting out stuff on Google maps. After we woke up, I confirmed the stuff with Brian, we agreed that what we had was good, and we set out!
My cold that I had picked up in Ireland, that had gotten a bit better while I was in France, was now in full “kill me now” mode again. I blame yesterday’s travel day. Two flights with a serious sinus infection can’t be healthy…Poor Brian. He hadn’t seen me in a month and a half, and here I was, a whiny, snotty, coughing mess. 😷 Fun fact: My whine factor goes from yellow to red as soon as someone sympathetic is around…
First stop on our map, the Dingli Cliffs. We kind of wandered around a bit lost at first, trying to figure out “the” spot to see them. I guess there’s more than one, so we decided to pull into a little parking lot by a small church and walk around. Very nice views, and we could see the little island of Filfa. The church is Saint Mary Magdalen, and was built in the 1600s. If you look at the doors, you’ll see those two little black circles. Those are grids, and you can see inside through them. Except that there’s no light, so you can’t really see. Someone had smashed a bigger hole in one of the grids- literally just big enough for the camera lenses to go against. I snapped this picture and couldn’t BELIEVE that it came out!! I could barely see any of that stuff with my bare eye!! Oooo-weeeee-oooo!! In the parking lot was a woman selling a bunch of little snacks and things. We got some traditional carab nougat and this crunchy, nutty beehive nougat that I fell in love with! Can’t have a road trip without snacks!
Next stop, the Malta Falconry Centre. Falconry is an ancient art of Malta. In fact, the knights that settled here actually paid the king of Spain one falcon a year for use of the island! The Centre gives flying demonstrations at 11am during the summer (only 1, because it’s too hot to fly the birds very often), so we made sure we got there at 10:30. It was 8 euros each, and we had time to wander around and look at the birds before the demonstration. WOW! So many different kinds! The property was really well laid out with large aviaries. The thing I found really interesting were the tethered birds. The area was called a mew- a place where falcons used to be housed by nobles who could afford them. There were ropes going from inside the mew to a perch outside on the grass. The birds were tethered to the rope, and could fly back and forth between shade and sun.
It was now 11 and we walked over to the field. There we met the lady that owns the place, and you could immediately see her love and passion for the birds! First, we met Harry the barn owl. She’s had him for 10 years, and he goes home with her every night! He would snuggle up against her and she would pet and kiss him….so cute. We even got to hold him! Then we met Dexter and Beauty- Harris Hawks. We got to see just how fast these guys are at chasing rabbits, as one of the workers ran with a rabbit lure and the bird was on it in no time. They always trade a little piece of food for the lure, instead of just taking the lure away. It builds trust. Then, we got to meet more owls- one with the biggest glass marble eyes and softest feathers you’ve ever seen!!!!! You could get lost in those eyes!! And the other, one of the smallest owl species in the world. This really was a cool experience, the animals were well taken care of, and the owner is just so passionate about them!
After making Brian turn all of his pockets inside out to check for birds, we headed to the next stop. Literally, we were on streets so narrow that we had to fold in the mirrors on our tiny rental car, and seriously thought we were on someone’s driveway instead of a street!! I don’t know what the heck you would do if a car was coming the other way. Thankfully, we didn’t have to find out! Here are a few things you need to know about Malta:
1. There are rocks EVERYWHERE. Random walls made of stacked rocks, the buildings are made of rocks. Seriously, it’s 50 shades of beige around here!! The joke was: Hi Malta, what do you do for a living? I stack rocks! What do you do for fun? Stack rocks! How do you unwind and relax? Stack rocks! We were pretty convinced that the island used to be about 10 feet higher above sea level until all of the rocks were extracted and stacked!
2. When you see rocks- in walls or making up buildings, you honestly have no idea if they are 50 years old or 5000 years old! Everything just has this “ancient” look and feel to it!
3. Every road in Malta leads to exactly where you want to go. Miss a turn? No problem! The road you’re on will eventually wind its way back in the right direction! Plus, I don’t think we ever took the same route to/from the airbnb to go anywhere!! We decided that the roads were laid out using a few bags of cooked spaghetti and a can of spaghetti-o’s. They flopped it out on to a surface, and the spaghetti created the roads and the o’s the roundabouts! Actually, it’s a really good system! 🙂
Yes, this is a road.
Next stop, ancient temples!! There were two on our list that were right next to each other in the same complex- Hagar Qim and Mnajdra. First, you watched a 4-d movie. I hate that shit. I don’t want a headache from 3-d images, and I don’t need to be sprinkled on when it’s raining on screen. It was just music, with English subtitles. Not too shabby overall. The museum was REALLY well done. It showed how they most likely moved the huge stone slabs- some of which weigh over 50 TONS!!!- by using rounded spheres to pull them along on. There were models showing the temple complexes as a whole so you could get a better idea of them. And a very iconic figure of a rather “rotund” person that was found here, and copies of which are in every souvenir shop in Malta! Actually, most of the statuary found here is of those fat little figures. Kinda cool! I’m assuming those weren’t the people doing the heavy lifting of building the temples…
Mnajdra
Hagar Qim
Before we go outside to look at the temples, let’s learn a bit about them! These are among the oldest free standing stone buildings IN THE WORLD, and are the oldest buildings period in Europe! Egyptian pyramids?? Newbies!! The Maltese temples date back over…wait for it…wait for it…5500 years ago!!!! Crazy!! They used to just be seen as a few random huge stones sticking up out of the ground. Those turned out to be the tops of the largest stones, and when the site was excavated, the temples were found. These people left no written records, we know little about them. They disappeared around 2500BC…
The first complex we came to was Hagar Qim. Both sites are covered with tents to protect them from the elements. The outside of the temples are built with a type of limestone that is very strong and resistant to the elements, but the inside is a softer limestone that is easily carved, but also easily eroded over time. Imagining these people moving these rocks, positioning them, carving them, carving HOLES into them for doors and designs…it was mind boggling.
After Hagar Qim, it was a long downhill walk to Mnajdra. Another thing you should know about Malta- there is basically no shade anywhere. There are very few trees. It’s kinda desert/scrubby. Again, the temples here were just amazing. There were places where they had tried to fix cracks with cement, before they realized that cement ate away the limestone. 🙁 Live and learn, I guess… On the way back, we opted for the 1 euro each golf cart ride up the hill. Ancient man can build temples with his bare hands. We can’t walk 500 meters uphill in the sun. 🙄
As we were making 100 turns down roads and following signs on our way to the temples, I kept seeing a sign for Blue Grotto. It wasn’t on our list, we didn’t remember seeing it in our research, so I mapped it, it was really close by (spoiler alert: Malta is small. EVERYTHING is close by!), so we decided to pop in and check it out. There was a boat ramp down to kind of an inlet in the rocks were colorful boats were docked, people were swimming- it was just beautiful! And, there were signs for boat rides. Brian went down and checked it out (I was not willing to pay more than 20 euros for a boat ride). Verdict? 8 euros!! Woo-hoo!! But first, food. We choose a little restaurant overlooking the water. And we had a little entertainment with our dining!! Watch until the end!
After lunch, we walked down for our 25 minute boat ride. I wasn’t expecting too much. Um, I was WRONG! Holy crap this was the best boat ride ever!! We glided through calm, amazingly blue waters of every shade, against sheer rock cliffs that were dotted with gorgeous sea caves- some of them big enough for us to go into. I was snapping pictures left and right, my battery died, so I had to use my phone. I was MES-MER-IZED!! These pics in no way do this place justice! I loved every second of this and would totally have paid 20 euros! What a fun, and unexpected twist to the day. This is why you’ve got to be open to go with the flow and not a slave to a schedule!!
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Last scheduled stop for the day was the old capital of Malta, Mdina (pronounced em (like the letter M)-deena). It was founded in the 8th century….BCE!!! Holy crap! About 2800 years ago!! By the Phoenicians. Insanity… The Romans took it over around 200 BCE, then some Byzantines, then some Muslims…basically everyone had a go at it! An earthquake pretty much destroyed it in the late 1600s, but true to its nature, it was rebuilt yet again in the 1700s. It’s gorgeous. I mean freaking knock your socks off, in a time machine back a thousand years or more, gorgeous. It was our favorite city in Malta.
We went into St. Paul’s Cathedral next. Again, a huge history with this place. It was the site of the Roman governor’s palace when Paul (yeah, that one from the New Testament) shipwrecked here. Apparently he healed a lot of people, and Malta converted to Christianity. A cathedral was built here in the 1200s, remodeled and modified throughout the centuries, and basically destroyed in that earthquake in the late 1600s. It was rebuilt in the early 1700s into the masterpiece it is today. From the outside, it’s just this huge, unassuming tan rock building. But inside….almost enough to make a heathen convert! 😋
A ticket to the church also bought you a ticket into the museum. Lots of ornate, gaudy, expensive ass church crap that should have been used to feed the poor….but I digress. There were a few cool things as well. Like this reliquary for some saint’s creepy skull. And some original documents like this one from back in 1420 (I can’t keep track of a to do list for more than an hour, and someone kept this for 600 years?!). And an awesome collection of ancient coins!! I found one a Greek one with an octopus that about 2400 years old!!!!! Honestly, I originally didn’t want to go into the museum. I just went because it was included in the price. But after I got past all of the church’s gross display of wealth, there was really some pretty fascinating history there!
We then walked to the last thing I wanted to see- St. Paul’s Catacombs. Got there at 4:25. Last entry was at 4:30- WHEW!! But the woman refused to let us in. We pointed out the sign. She informed us that we needed 2 hours. Ok…. I was kinda disappointed, but we stopped for ice cream so I forgot about it (lie- I held a grudge, but we won’t get into that). Drove back to the bnb and both decided we were thoroughly enjoying Malta!
Last night when we got back, we started piecing together today’s adventures. We knew we wanted to go to the capital, Valleta, and had a walking tour booked there for 5. We also wanted to go to the Hypogeum. Other than that, no plans. Brian found a place called the Ghar Dalam cave that had the remains of prehistoric animals in it. That sounded super cool, so we added it to the list, and decided to head down there first. Pulled into the parking lot and walked down to the little museum. 5 euros each to get in. Honestly, I had zero idea what to expect here (one of the joys of not really putting any research into something!). We went into a little museum. Now, I’ve been in all kinds of museums- super huge ones, like the Louvre, super fancy video based ones like Epic in Dublin. But this is really MY kind of museum!! It’s literally the type of museum I remember from when I was a kid, circa 1979. Simple presentation, highly informative in a few words- think a couple of steps up from a science fair type of presentation! I’m teaching Earth Science next semester, and this museum was literally a WEALTH of information!! That 5 euro investment will be returned 1000 fold… I took pictures of every single sign! Let me just give you the basics, because even just the basics are fascinating! So during the last Ice Age, all kinds of weird animals lived in Europe that don’t now. Many of those animals were forced further and further south by the advancing glaciation (cold temps). Because so much water was freezing, sea levels dropped, creating a land bridge between mainland Italy, Sicily, and Malta. Animals could then get from the mainland to Malta, where there was no ice age because it was too far south.
Now here’s where it gets crazy….what kinds of animals?? Oh, how about ELEPHANTS AND HIPPOS!! 🐘😲 Eventually, water levels rose again, trapping the animals on the island. And as we should know from places such as Australia and the Galapagos, evolution gets a little cray-cray when populations are isolated. And in this case, something happened that I had never heard about before. Nanism. It’s basically evolutionary dwarfism in response to a population having limited resources (an island as small as Malta couldn’t possibly sustain huge grazing animals like elephants for very long- so if you’re smaller, you need less food = better chance of survival), a lack of predators (you don’t need to be as big if nothing is really bothering you), and interbreeding (because no new animals are entering the gene pool, making mutations more abundant- survival of the fittest in action!!). Check out these size comparisons!!! It totally blew my mind!! I will admit, I was totally science/history teacher GEEKING OUT in this place. I can’t imagine anyone who has ever come here was ever that engrossed!! 🤓
The other half of the museum was an exhibit of about a gazillion fossils that have been extracted from the cave. Amazing!! Just look at all those hippo teeth! And there were even more display cases with them!
Now it was time to head into the cave. This is where I took off my biology teacher hat and put on my earth science one! The cave is an excellent example of the deposits of different sedimentary layers (stratification). There are 6 main layers in the cave. By calculating the age of the fossils found in each layer, we can calculate the age of the layers themselves. For example, there is one layer that has all of the hippo bones (called the hippopotamus layer). It’s the 2nd deepest layer. Below it is a clay layer where no fossils are found. Above the hippo layer is a layer of pebbles. Then the deer layer (where, shockingly enough, lots of ancient deer fossils are found!). Then a layer of calcium. And finally, on top, a layer where the remains of domestic animals and humans (bones and pottery) are found. FASCINATING!! This cave is really worth the trip if you are into this kind of thing. It was one of my favorite things in Malta (this and Blue Grotto from yesterday- the two completely unexpected, unplanned things- go figure!)
Next stop on the list, Hypogeum. We didn’t really know what it was, other than underground temples that were on UNESCO. The map took us into a city….huh? Temples in a city?? It literally showed them just on some city block. We saw the building with the sign on it. SO WEIRD! We drove around for a bit trying to find a spot to park, and finally did. Walked to the building, and….there was a sign….it said that all tickets were booked until August 29. Um, that’s like a month and a half way. And the entrance fee was 40 FUCKING EUROS EACH (that’s like $50)?? What the hell was down there? Jesus’ tomb, the aliens from area 51, and an amusement park??? Even if we could have gone in, I can’t imagine paying that kind of money. Apparently you have to book way in advance. Oh well, adios Hypogeum. I’ll google you. Cheaper.
Last stop, the capital city of Valleta. But it was going to be a long stop with- the rest of the day. We knew we wanted to be there for the firing of the cannons at noon, so we pulled in about 11:30 and parked outside the city gates. Made our way up to the rampart, and found a spot on the high wall, crammed in with a ton of people who all had the same idea! The view was AMAZING! Across the grand harbor, you could see the “Three Cities”…Birgu, Senglea and Cospicua- all medieval. At noon, a person came out and loaded the canon. So glad we saw it!
Next on our list were the war tunnels. Malta was an extremely integral part of WW2, because of their position in the Mediterranean next to Italy. And they were under British rule at the time. Spoiler alert: Italy was the enemy of Britain. We bought our ticket, and then realized we bought a ticket to the Lascaris War Rooms– not the tunnel. But by the time we realized it we had already climbed down a billion stairs and were not interested in climbing back up in the heat, so we decided to stay. Here’s where I have to say this fact- on a tour, the guide is EVERYTHING. Our guide, bless his heart, you could tell was knowledgeable about the place. But his delivery…oh my god. So monotone. And the tour didn’t “move” enough. We would spend literally 15 minutes in one room with a monotone lecture, then move to the next. It was not enjoyable. Brian was literally falling asleep. Like to the point I was nudging him because I thought he was going to fall over. (Remember, I make the poor guy hit the ground running- no time for jet lag!!) It’s really a shame, because the rooms themselves were quite interesting! They were kept hidden and secret so they wouldn’t be bombed- because did you know Malta was the most bombed place on EARTH during WW2??!! 💣😱 DAMN!! From these rooms, information would come in about bombers flying in, their positions would be tracked, and defensive measures would be ordered. It was all so low tech. I mean, my phone in my pocket is 1000 times more advanced than what they were using to fight an entire war! Craziness! Just how important was Malta? Well, Eisenhower and Churchill themselves were here…
Do you see the smile on this guy? Who could possibly resist that?? <3
Where Eisenhower would sit.
After the fourteen hour one hour tour was over (I wish we had just opted for the audio guide), we headed out on the streets. We had found a little Maltese restaurant online that had good reviews, so we went and made reservations for 7:30- right after our walking tour would end. The streets were all decorated for the patron saint’s day that was being celebrated. Had we been here for the weekend, we would have been able to see parades and fireworks!! And not just in Valleta. Every city in Malta has their own patron saint and this is festival week!
Then, we headed to the next stop on our list- the palace armory. This was more for Brian, because I know how much he loves weapons (such a boy!). You had to buy a combination ticket for the armory AND the palace, and I really didn’t want to go into the palace. But there was no choice. ☹ I went begrudgingly. They were out of audio guides (sigh). We’re walking through and it’s ok. I kept telling Brian how this was no Versailles (if you knew me, you would know the snotty attitude tone that came with that statement!), and how Louis XIV wouldn’t even keep his horses in here (sorry if you’re a fan of the Malta palace, but it really isn’t a palace!!!). Once you’ve seen Versailles, it’s hard to get impressed… Anyway, we get to kind of the end and there’s this big red room. It’s really dark inside, but I see a painting that catches my eye. I told Brian, “That looks like Louis XVI!” For those of you who don’t teach French history, are not staunch French royalists, and cannot recognize Henry IV, Louis XIV, and Louis XVI (my 3 favorite kings) in any setting, let me explain who Louis XVI is- he’s the last real king of France…the one who lost his head… In my eyes, that’s when French history ends (well, actually when that stanky Robespierre dies, but this is Malta, not France, so I’ll shut up). Anywho, I use the camera to zoom in on the sign under it. I can read the word Roi (French for King). I zoomed up to the face, and it WAS Louis XVI!!! WOW!! One of my kings!! Then, I looked at the painting next to it. It was really dark and really hard to see, but damn if it didn’t look like Louis XIV (my sun king who built Versailles). I zoomed in, and it WAS him!! Oh my god! I was so excited!! You don’t understand how ridiculous I get about my kings!! Had I not come in here, I would have missed them! And it was so funny that I had just been talking about them…
Of course, now I’m on cloud nine, practically skipping to the armory with Brian in tow, blathering on about the kings. Again, the armory is his thing, so I turned the camera over to him. 😊
Think we’ve done everything in Valleta? Not by a long shot! We still had time before our walking tour, so we went to the St. John’s Co-Cathedral. Here, we were especially interested in seeing the Caravaggio paintings. Cuz we’re upper crust art lovers like that. Um, yeah, not really, but we did want to see the paintings. Like everything in Malta, from the outside, the cathedral was a bunch of tan stacks of rock blocks. Nothing really stood out. But inside- YOWZA!!!!!!! It looked like the freaking Baroque period- ALL of it- exploded and landed all over the floors, walls, and ceilings!!!!! It was built in the 1570s. No way are any of these pics even coming close to capturing this place… See those 8 arched rooms- 4 on each side? Those are chapels that represent each of the 8 leagues of Knights from the Order of St. John (we’ll learn about them later). Each league basically represented a major European country/region, and each chapel is dedicated to the patron saint of that league. The entire floor of this chapel consists of the decorated tombs of knights of the order. Just….WOW. Do NOT miss this place! I, of course, found the French chapels of the most interest. 🙂
Caravaggio’s Beheading of St. John the Baptist. Huge and GORGEOUS
It was now time for our free walking tour of Valleta! Which means history lesson time! We could tell immediately that the guide was going to be good- and he was! I didn’t take a lot of pictures, because we had already seen most of the things he showed us. Which was good, because I then I could focus on the history part! So here we go- 500 years of Malta in a few sentences…. So there was this order of knights called the Knights of St. John aka the Hospitallers. They were made up, as I mentioned earlier, of knights from all over Europe- 8 leagues specifically. Their job was to take care of pilgrims who went to the holy city of Jerusalem during the Crusades. Which was great while the Christians could go there. But when the Ottomans put up “No Jesus Freaks” signs all over Jerusalem, the knights had to pack up and head elsewhere. But where? Well, a few places. And it seemed like no where was a good permanent fit, because everywhere they ended up, the Ottomans (aka Muslims) would run them out. Finally, Charles V of Spain, who was the Holy Roman Emperor (and who I have great issues with because #france, but I digress….), gave the knights Malta. Well actually, as per Brian’s research and confirmed by our guide, they rented Malta from the king for the price of one falcon per year. So they get to Malta and were like, “Um, yeah. If real estate is location, location, location, we’re kinda screwed. This place is desolate, isn’t defensible unless we want to throw rocks, and we already constantly have Muslims trying to overtake us. They’ll be here in no time. It’s a nice place to visit, but we don’t want to live here.” Except they really had no other choice, so they just kind of hung out for a few years, biding their time until a better situation came along. Well, something came along, and it wasn’t a better situation. It was that pesky Ottoman Empire!! The Muslims were determined to get themselves into Europe to put up their “No Jesus Freaks” signs. And Malta would be an excellent base from which to invade mainland Europe. Thus began the Great Siege of Malta in the year 1565. I’m not going to go into the details- just the nitty gritty. Those knights, who had been run out of a few other places by these Ottomans already, were OVER. IT. The knights, and their army, with the people of Malta, numbered about 6,000. They ended up kicking ass and taking about 40,000 Muslim names!! Holy jihad, Batman!
After the practically miraculous job the knights did at defeating the Ottomans, Europe was damn impressed. They didn’t want those Muslims coming to the mainland! And the knights seemed to know how to stop them. Money started pouring in from all over Europe to help with the defenses of Malta- the first line against those pesky Ottomans! And with this money, the city of Valleta was built and fortified in 1566 (aka “stacking rocks”). Over the next couple of decades, it grew and grew and more people moved there. And the knights ruled Malta for over 250 years, until that sorry ass stink weasel Napoleon (ugh, I hate even having to type his nasty name), stomped on over with his tiny boots in 1798, and forced the knights to surrender. The Maltese people, much like me, freaking HATED Napoleon, so they invited Britain over to help them out. In typical British fashion, “help” meant “we’ll take your country when we’re done, thank you very much”, and Malta was under British rule until 1964, when it became independent.
After the tour, which we tipped quite nicely for because it was just that awesome, it was dinner time. Thank god, because we were famished. Went back to our restaurant, La Pira, and ordered an appetizer of some kind of bread covered in something that was DAMN TASTY. I ordered the stewed rabbit and Brian ordered the wild boar ravioli. Both were soooooo good!!
There’s that smile again #swoon
After dinner, we strolled through the city, hand in hand, down narrow cobblestone streets as night fell. It was just so lovely. The opera house that had been bombed into ruins during WW2, has been recently brought back to life. The ruins are still there, and now it’s more of an open air theater. I think it’s really cool! They were rehearsing for an upcoming show, so I took a peek. On the way out, the awesome merman fountain was all lit up. Perfect ending to such a lovely day!
Last full day in Malta! How can you be anything other than thrilled with the new day when you wake up to this view off your balcony??
Today we decided to go to Gozo Island and explore. We also wanted to be back by 6 so we’d have some time to do laundry and chill out a bit. You have to take a ferry over (20 euros round trip, payable upon return). We drove over to the dock and got in line. These ferries are really big! There are multiple levels for cars, which is cool. We parked and walked out to the decks to see the view. This water… I swear… It is SO clear! Even right here at a boat dock! Saw a school of fish, which always makes me happy.
Crossing paths with one of the other ferries. We’re on the same kind of ferry.
Entering the harbor at Gozo Island.
It was about a 30 minute trip across the channel. We had planned kind of a counter clockwise drive around the island to check out a few things, and planned to end the day with some swimming. First stop was Blue Hole. On the way, we drove thru the town of Victoria, which was all decorated for its feast day. Best decorations we’ve seen so far! Then, I saw signs for the Ta’ Dbiegi Crafts Village. We decided to follow them, and luckily it ended up being right on our route to Blue Hole. You never know what “crafts village” could mean. Normally, it’s “junky Chinese souvenir village”- which is something that makes me hurl. 😖 As soon as we pulled up though, I could tell it wasn’t that! Don’t get me wrong, there were a few hokey kinds of things. But the draw here was that there were several REAL studios, with craftspeople working their trade. Jewelry, leatherwork, weaving, candle making….and then the one that really caught our eye. Glass blowing. We went into the shop, and there were really some GORGEOUS pieces. We are not knick knack people (I called them “dust collectors”). And we only do souvenirs if we are “supporting local”, and they have some meaning for us. We don’t do junk. This stuff, was cool. And the best part? The studio was attached to the shop and you could watch them working!! Of course, I found a glass fish and immediately fell in love. Went into the studio, and they were making fish!! But the sign said no pictures. 😢 We went in and bought a fish for our “cabinet of travel curiosities” in our dining room, and I tentatively asked if I could take pictures. I mean, I had bought something- I wasn’t just an annoying looky-loo! The lady said yes, so I went out and told the man making fish that I had permission. Wow. So cool!!
As we pulled into the Blue Hole parking lot, we knew this was a super touristy thing! Lots of covered souvenir stalls and such. We walked down the path and got to the water. There was literally a large hole, and divers were coming in and out. Apparently it’s like 50 feet deep! People were swimming around in it, too. We walked around, took a few shots, and headed back out. Oh, and I did cave and buy a pair of sunglasses at a souvenir stand. My eyes were killing me- light colored rocks everywhere + sunshine = squinting = wrinkles = headache = nope.
The rocks were so strange- all pitted with little pools. See the defensive tower in the background? They’re all over the island
Next stop, the other side of the island to the salt pans. Other side of the island means like 6 miles. It’s not a big island… The salt pans actually turned out to be pretty cool! The Romans built the first ones. They’re large, shallow rectangular pans carved into the rock at the shore. The pans are filled with seawater. The water evaporates, leaving behind the salt that could then be collected. Cool! There was a lady with a cart selling salt, and we bought a bag for 2 euros. I love supporting that kind of thing!
We decided to walk around the area and explore a bit more. By the time we were done, it was 1230. I declared it to be lunch time, so we ordered a cheeseburger, a bacon and egg sandwich, fries, and two drinks from a little stand on the beach. 10 euros, so not bad at all! And pretty tasty to boot! Apparently I was so hungry that I forgot to snap a pic. That’s serious, people. 😑
Next stop, Calypso’s Cave- as in the cave Homer writes about in The Odyssey. We knew from research that the cave was no longer accessible, but the views of the red sand beach, Ramla l-Ħamra, were supposed to be nice. And they were! I wish we had spent more time here. I wish we had gone down to the beach…
Last major stop before swimming were the Ġgantija temples- the oldest of all the temples on Malta, about 5500 years old! On the way in, there were these MASSIVE bees with blue-black wings all over some yellow lantana. I took about 500 shots trying to get one in focus because they were fast as hell and only stayed on a flower for a few seconds. Here are the 2 that actually turned out. You’re welcome. (I’m desperate for wildlife shots…) Please comment praise and admiration for my mad photog skillz below, because I worked damn hard for those shots!! 😜 So…9 euros each to get into the temples. And honestly, they were just eh. The temples from day 2 were much nicer. We both said we could have easily skipped this.
Pear shaped peeps- rocking it since 3500 BC!
These are made out of COW TOE BONES!!!!!!!!!
Last stop of the day…. Finally time to take a dip in the Mediterranean! We had researched some boat trips last night, but were too late to book a scheduled trip. We did see that a lot of ferries went back and forth to a place called the Blue Lagoon on Comino Island, which was one of the main stops on the boat that we had wanted to book. So we decided to wing it. I noticed that there were a few ferry kiosks on the dock selling tickets. Perfect! I could smell a discount if I played my cards right. Which meant not looking too eager… As soon as we stepped on the dock, the first guy came up to us, asking if we were going to blue lagoon. Yes. Well, he had a boat leaving now. 10 euros each. I kept cool. “OK, let me take a brochure with the times. I want to check out the other companies…” I knew all of the companies charged the same rate from my online research. Sure enough, he said 15 euros for both of us if we’d go now. Sold. And while we were handing him our money, another couple walked up and paid 20. It’s about understanding the game and playing it. 😎 Fast, fun little boat ride over to Comino, which is kind of in between the main island and Gozo.
This water is INSANE!!!!!!
As soon as we docked, I didn’t want to be here. I wasn’t sure how to tell Brian. You’re probably thinking, “WTF is wrong with you, woman?!”. Well, the dock was PACKED with people. Like sardines packed. Like could barely get off the boat because there were so many people. And the path to the beach was packed. And there were hawkers trying to rent you an umbrella or a chair. And souvenir stands. And people fucking EVERYWHERE. I mean, I didn’t see how we could even set our bags down with our cameras and stuff and swim- of course unless we rented a locker. We walked around the little bay area, and I finally broke down and told Brian I hated this place. He agreed. We turned right back around to see if we could pay for some other boat to take us somewhere, anywhere, else!! At the dock, there was a company that could take us to see the sea caves, and then drop us at another beach across from Blue Lagoon that had hardly any people on it (we could see it from where we were standing). I can’t remember how much it was (because I didn’t fucking care- get me the hell out of here!!), but I think like 15 euros each or something. First were the sea caves, and we had about 5 other people on the boat with us for that. They were cool- I enjoyed the Blue Grotto caves from a couple of days ago a lot more, but anything to get me off Sardine Beach Blue Lagoon.
Another boat met us and took the other people off our boat, and then we went and got dropped off on the other beach. We told the guy to pick us up in an hour (we aren’t lounge on the beach people, so we didn’t need a lot of time). We headed down the little path to choose a secluded spot. We found a little rock platform where no one was (everyone else had walked further down to the beach area). We clambered down the rocks to get to it. And that’s when it sunk in for me. I was expected to actually get into the water. I have a degree in marine biology. I know what’s in the water. I hate to get in the water. Plus, I’m not a strong swimmer. The water looked deep. Crystal clear, but deep. Fuuuuck. But my man likes to swim, and by god I was going to swim with him. Maybe. Probably. Yeah, I was. Oh, and did I mention I didn’t have a swimsuit? Fortunately, I only travel with ExOfficio Crossover Bras, and they look more like a bikini top than a bra, so no worries. So that and my shorts served the purpose. I sat on the rock platform. Other than something eating me and drowning, fear of cold water also keeps me on the sidelines. Brian, of course, was already in, and said it was warm. He’d say that as the Titanic was going down, so I didn’t put much faith in it. I put in a foot. OMG FREEZING!!!!!!!!! Note: Any water less than 85 degrees is freezing. I am not exaggerating. It took me a good 5 minutes to finally ease myself in. Cold water…conquered. Now I was scared of drowning. I told Brian to stay close and I was going to just doggy paddle because I’m best at that. And I actually was doing really good! We absolutely could not touch the bottom, even though we could see it. I’m guessing 12-15 feet at least. We’re cruising along, enjoying the solitude, when Brian gets an alarmed look on his face and blurts out that something just tagged him. He then immediately shut up, because he knows how freaked out I get in the water. In fact, the first thing I said after I got my entire body in was, “If something touches me, I’m going to panic and drown.” So I have no idea if he’s missing a leg or what the hell is going on, because he isn’t talking, he’s just swimming back, and I’m doggy paddling as fast as I can, and asking him what was it (asking is generous, more like frantically squeaking out the question multiple times). He finally says jellyfish. HOLY CRAP. We had seen swarms of two different types of jellys on the ferry ride over- brown and white. I had seen signs about jellys, and knew that box jellys (which can be DEADLY) were in the area, and here we were, secluded with no boat. Let’s just say that I’m about to have a nervous breakdown in 15 feet of water. He said he saw it, and it was a brown one. We had both been stung in Cuba a couple of years ago, and I was not looking for a repeat performance. We made it back to the rock platform, climbed out, and looked at his inner thigh, just under his short’s leg. It was red, but not terrible. We will carry vinegar with us from now on. We’re two out of two for getting stung in the ocean…
Zoom of Blue Lagoon across the water from us. You can see how packed it is at the beach area. Ridiculous.
After that debacle, we decided to head down to the sandy beach area and check it out. We walked around in the water a bit, but I was freaked out because I had seen sea urchins and was afraid of stepping on one. Never go into the ocean with a scaredy cat marine biologist…. Soon it was time to head back to meet our boat. It took us back to the crowded dock, where we had to wait on our return boat. We walked to the life guard shack to get a spray of vinegar for Brian’s leg, then headed back to the dock so we would be first in line for our return. Thank GOD the return actually showed up about 30 minutes early so we could get the hell out of there!
Bottom line, Blue Lagoon was a huge waste of time and money. I wish we had known, and just stayed at Ramla l-Ħamra by Calypso’s Cave. Not crowded and free. Or even the little beach by the salt pans. Took the ferry back to the main island, headed to the bnb, where we cooked a frozen pizza and did laundry. All in all, we thoroughly enjoyed our time in Malta! We both agreed it would have been best if we would have had 2 more days, because there’s a lot we didn’t get to explore. Maybe someday we’ll return. 🙂 But tomorrow is travel day, and we’re off to Rome!
I was the first one in the parking lot at 8:48am!! Woo-hoo!! But no sooner than I started walking up the long path to the site, cars started pulling in. That put a giddity up in my hitch, because I wanted to be the first to the top!! And I was. Went to the ticket counter. 10 lei. I headed toward the site and saw an audio guide icon. Went back. 20 lei ($5). A bit pricey, I thought. But ok, I’ll bite since I know zilch about this place. I should have saved my money. The audio guide was pretty bad….
And this one is probably the oldest painting in the world of the Annunciation (when the angel told Mary her EPT test would be coming out positive).
Landed in Catania, and settled in for the long haul. A 7, yes 7 hour layover. I considered leaving the airport and exploring the city, but by the time I would have had to deal with finding a place to store my luggage (no way I was carrying it around with me), get to the city, figure out what to do, get back, get my luggage, get through security…I decided it just wasn’t worth it. So I got a piece of pizza (when in Italy!), sat on the floor, and tried to entertain myself on my phone for 7….long….hours….
I stood by the bus stop, sipping my Dr. Pepper like the boss lady traveler I am, counting down the minutes until my man arrived! Saw the X1 bus coming, pulled my 3 euros out of my pocket where they had been stashed separately for efficiency, walked up to the curb….and watched the driver literally look me straight in the eye and keep going. MOTHER FUCKER!!!!!!! Now what?! I looked at my phone. It was almost 8:40. Brian lands at 9:40, except I knew he was a little late leaving Barcelona. There were no other buses that would get me there before 10:30 though, and I had to make a connection (which is not something I was interested in doing in the dark when I had no clue where I was). So here we fucking go, cab #3 of the day. I came back to the house and called the cab guy the owner had recommended in his welcome guide. That guy said he couldn’t do it. FUCK! So I jumped online and searched for an alternative. There is no uber in Malta. Found something called 
Before we go outside to look at the temples, let’s learn a bit about them! These are among the oldest free standing stone buildings IN THE WORLD, and are the oldest buildings period in Europe! Egyptian pyramids?? Newbies!! The Maltese temples date back over…wait for it…wait for it…5500 years ago!!!! Crazy!! They used to just be seen as a few random huge stones sticking up out of the ground. Those turned out to be the tops of the largest stones, and when the site was excavated, the temples were found. These people left no written records, we know little about them. They disappeared around 2500BC…
Now here’s where it gets crazy….what kinds of animals?? Oh, how about ELEPHANTS AND HIPPOS!! 🐘😲 Eventually, water levels rose again, trapping the animals on the island. And as we should know from places such as Australia and the Galapagos, evolution gets a little cray-cray when populations are isolated. And in this case, something happened that I had never heard about before. Nanism. It’s basically evolutionary dwarfism in response to a population having limited resources (an island as small as Malta couldn’t possibly sustain huge grazing animals like elephants for very long- so if you’re smaller, you need less food = better chance of survival), a lack of predators (you don’t need to be as big if nothing is really bothering you), and interbreeding (because no new animals are entering the gene pool, making mutations more abundant- survival of the fittest in action!!). Check out these size comparisons!!! It totally blew my mind!! I will admit, I was totally science/history teacher GEEKING OUT in this place. I can’t imagine anyone who has ever come here was ever that engrossed!! 🤓
Now it was time to head into the cave. This is where I took off my biology teacher hat and put on my earth science one! The cave is an excellent example of the deposits of different sedimentary layers (stratification). There are 6 main layers in the cave. By calculating the age of the fossils found in each layer, we can calculate the age of the layers themselves. For example, there is one layer that has all of the hippo bones (called the hippopotamus layer). It’s the 2nd deepest layer. Below it is a clay layer where no fossils are found. Above the hippo layer is a layer of pebbles. Then the deer layer (where, shockingly enough, lots of ancient deer fossils are found!). Then a layer of calcium. And finally, on top, a layer where the remains of domestic animals and humans (bones and pottery) are found. FASCINATING!! This cave is really worth the trip if you are into this kind of thing. It was one of my favorite things in Malta (this and Blue Grotto from yesterday- the two completely unexpected, unplanned things- go figure!)
After the 
Of course, now I’m on cloud nine, practically skipping to the armory with Brian in tow, blathering on about the kings. Again, the armory is his thing, so I turned the camera over to him. 😊
Last stop of the day…. Finally time to take a dip in the Mediterranean! We had researched some boat trips last night, but were too late to book a scheduled trip. We did see that a lot of ferries went back and forth to a place called the Blue Lagoon on Comino Island, which was one of the main stops on the boat that we had wanted to book. So we decided to wing it. I noticed that there were a few ferry kiosks on the dock selling tickets. Perfect! I could smell a discount if I played my cards right. Which meant not looking too eager… As soon as we stepped on the dock, the first guy came up to us, asking if we were going to blue lagoon. Yes. Well, he had a boat leaving now. 10 euros each. I kept cool. “OK, let me take a brochure with the times. I want to check out the other companies…” I knew all of the companies charged the same rate from my online research. Sure enough, he said 15 euros for both of us if we’d go now. Sold. And while we were handing him our money, another couple walked up and paid 20. It’s about understanding the game and playing it. 😎 
