Roma

Hi, so it turns out that I have a few more people reading then I originally thought. Sorry about the delay.
Anyway, here's some of the better photos from my trip to rome.

Myself and Charlotte decided to meet there (she was at a hospital in London) as it was her birthday. What we didn't realise was that it was the beautification of Pope John Paul II that weekend...which explained why accomodation was so hard to find. And also why there were so many nuns in the airport.

First stop was the Colosseum. Which was pretty awesome. Highlight: having the tour guide point out that the holes in the wall were from generations of romans stripping the lead out of one of their most famous buildings. (Although I think that was stopped a while ago)

 Me sitting on ruins (gently) right next to a sign asking you not to climb on the ruins (I wasn't climbing, I was sitting)

At the Trevi Fountain, absolutely beautiful. And if you throw a coin in you are supposed to come back one day

Me about to throw the coin

I kind of threw it a bit high, but it did get in

Thing is, the fountain was lovely. But this is how crowded it is

After a very very good pizza dinner we walked home back past the colosseum.

Candle light gathering for JPII

Colosseum

Free food as handed out by catholic people

Heading to the beautification, most shots contain people in them but that's just an accurate view of what I saw. Very very crowded. At one point I thought that I was going to be crushed by a crowd containing nuns. Which would have been embarrassing. 

Waited in line 2 hours to get inside

Pope's coffin

We stopped at the spanish steps on the way home, and had a lovely pasta dinner nearby.

Final photo for Rome. Taken at the colosseum. It's a horse torso...or horso!

Yay Pun!

Malta (Finally)

Hey peoples,

so I've finally finally gotten around to the first Malta post. Hurray. The place I'm staying is pretty decent. I'm sharing a room with an English medical student. She seems pretty nice, so we've decided to be travel buddies and explore Malta together. Hurray, tomorrow we are going to Mdina for dinner. It's an old fortified city and is supposed to be gorgeously medieval.

This is Valletta. It is across the harbour from Sliema (where I'm staying) It was built in the 1500s by the Knights of Malta. These photos are from the promenade on Sliema's side of the harbour.

Anyway, first photos are the area around where I am staying.

The following photos are of the promenade itself. I was just down there an hour or so ago having ice cream for dessert. The ice cream here is amazing. I am going to come home super tubby.

On Sunday we went over to Gozo. That's a smaller more rural island that is still part of Malta but fiercely independent. It was a gorgeous warm day and we caught the ferry over early.

This is the view from the ferry as we approached Gozo's main harbour

We stopped for lunch in the capital of Gozo - Rabat (or Victoria). We ate on a roof top garden overlooking the main square. This is the restaurant plus the view (And in the photo below is my roommate)

After Lunch we wandered through the streets of Rabat a bit trying to find the citadel, turns out it was right near where we started. Below is St Georges.

I am very taken with the quaint little alley ways that are most of the streets around Malta. So here's a few pictures of what we saw while we were lost

All along the streets are these little religious shrines.

Eventually we managed to find the citadel. Which was an awesome complex to wander around and also had fantastic views over most of Gozo.

Then we went to the Ggantija temples. These are basically some of the worlds oldest ruins, well older than the pyramids or stonehenge, erected around 3600bc.

Finally we sat in one of the bars on the waterfront with a very nice local wine before catching the ferry home. Perfect end to the day.