{"id":798,"date":"2013-07-12T10:05:45","date_gmt":"2013-07-12T09:05:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/merrington.net\/?p=798"},"modified":"2013-07-12T10:05:45","modified_gmt":"2013-07-12T09:05:45","slug":"mdina-and-gozo-hilltop-fortresses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/?p=798","title":{"rendered":"Mdina and Gozo – Hilltop fortresses"},"content":{"rendered":"

There are three inhabited islands in the country of Malta, Malta, Gozo and Comino. We have been touring around all three.<\/p>\n

\"Entrance<\/a>
Entrance to Mdina<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mdina was the first capital of Malta, a walled fortress in the middle of the island, built by intrepid Phoenician sailors about 600 BC. \u00a0If you stand in the Citadel in Victoria on Gozo, a smaller island to the west of the island Malta, you see several hill top villages. \u00a0This is what I think looking at the 7 Hills of Rome would have looked like in the Middle Ages. A church and houses on each hilltop, surrounded by walls, to keep the enemy out.<\/p>\n

The importance of keeping the enemy out was made apparent by the sign on the church of St Agatha in Mdina, to the effect: When the Saracens were attacking, the people of Mdina could see their boats come into the harbour, so Mdina shut its gates. \u00a0A woman had a dream; she was visited in the dream by St Agatha, who said that every man in the village should hold up St Agatha’ s statute or picture around the bastion. \u00a0The Saracens could see there were so many men to fight, it would be a difficult battle. \u00a0They left Mdina and went back to their boats. \u00a0The note went on to say, the Saracens went over to Gozo and took the entire population of the island away as slaves. (The people of Gozo may not have had a direct line to St Agatha.)<\/p>\n

\"Statue,<\/a>
Statue, complete with awning at Mdina<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Both hill top fortresses are still robust and stark in their beauty. They inform us that life was not easy and safety has always been an important factor in life.<\/p>\n

\"Il<\/a>
Il Kastell, Victoria, Gozo<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Gozo is very quiet compared to Malta, with lovely beaches and its historic hilltop towns.<\/p>\n

\"Gozo<\/a>
Gozo Countryside<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Comino is the small island between the two. Good marinas but the anchorages are very joggly. \u00a0We stopped at Comino for a swim, first going to the Blue Grotto which literally overflowing with boats, several ferries with boom boxes and joy riding speed boats zooming past to add to the wash. \u00a0We went to the next small bay next door and had lunch and a swim.<\/p>\n

\"Boats<\/a>
Boats in the blue lagoon, Comino Island<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Today we will go and explore more in Gozo, have a swim and climb to see citadels. \u00a0The one thing we have missed is gelato, it seems unnatural to climb all those stairs without it. They do have ice cream in Malta, but it’s just not the same.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are three inhabited islands in the country of Malta, Malta, Gozo and Comino. We have been touring around all three. Mdina was the first capital of Malta, a walled fortress in the middle of the island, built by intrepid Phoenician sailors about 600 BC. \u00a0If you stand in the Citadel in Victoria on Gozo, … Continue reading Mdina and Gozo – Hilltop fortresses<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adventures-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3VxXq-cS","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=798"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":812,"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/798\/revisions\/812"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/merrington.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}