Mediterranean Escape 2016: the Blue Grotto 02-21-2016

He put on a show in the harbor

the Ottomans were here first

Harbor, Malta's national boats

Farmers Market

The weather is very nice. Short sleeve. We had a tour set up today to visit the Blue Grotto and a fishing village by the name of Marsaxlokk. Both of these locations are high on the tourists' list of places to go. Since we are in that category, off we went. Although, I might add, our day got off to a somewhat difficult start. Our instructions were to meet our tour bus at Dick's Bar, just down the street from our hotel. We would be picked up at 0910. So we left our hotel and walked down to Dick's. We got there at 0855. 0910 rolled around...no bus. We waited until 0920, no bus, then walked back to the hotel. We told the concierge there was no bus. He called the tour company and they said the driver stopped to pick us up. We were not there. We were there, no bus. Long story short...another bus was sent to pick us up and join the tour group. Once we connected with the group, we had a good tour.
The Blue Grotto is located on the southern coast of Malta. It has always been a favorite destination for tourists, but many in the US became aware of it when the location was used in the Brad Pitt film "Troy" filmed in 2004.
Marsaxlokk has a long history as a fishing village, but it is also well known for its Sunday fish market and flea market. The village has a population of 3400, but the tourists come by the thousands every Sunday. The harbor was used as an anchorage for the Ottoman Fleet during the Great Siege of Malta. It was also here that the first Phoenicians landed in the ninth century BC and set up trading posts. We walked down to the docks near our hotel and saw an interesting sight. There was a guy putting on quite a show using water propulsion.
Our trip here is coming to an end. Tomorrow we will do some more sightseeing and then take a flight back to Sicily. We should be headed home either Tuesday or Wednesday. We plan to be in Auburn this time next week.