All Around Valletta

Trip date: January 2022

In Malta's Grand Harbor, January 1, 2022 greeted us with spectacularly sunny skies. After a full day/new year's eve the day before we were all happy to relax on our vrbo yacht for the better part of the day. We cobbled together lunch from leftovers, sat out in the sunshine, and did some laundry at the marina facilities.

Later in the day we took a water ferry across to Valletta. There are a couple of different ways to get from the marina to Valletta; you can drive, you can take a large water taxi, or you can take one of the little traditional dghajsa boats that have been used as water taxis since the Phoenician times! 

I was hesitant at first, as they seem a bit rickety, but it's hard to beat €2 per person and the pick-up was just down from our dock. In the end it was a great way to see more of the harbor and I liked supporting the local owners.

In the capital city we had a great time walking around. We started by heading up the Barrakka Lift which takes you 190 feet up the cliff to a stunning look out. They have been firing cannons at noon and at 4pm here for 500 years. Unfortunately they weren't fired when we there; maybe because it was a holiday?

The 450+ year old city, built by the Knights of St John, is incredibly beautiful. And besides the Knights, the city has been ruled by the Phoenicians, Greeks, Carthaginians, Romans, Byzantines and Arabs. This comes through in the language, the architecture, and the dizzying array of monuments, 320 of them in the tiny capital!

Even though most places were closed, as it was Jan 1st, just wandering the streets was really great. I mean, the entire city is a UNESCO World Heritage site!

During our walk we passed by the Church of St. Paul's Shipwreck. Come to find out that in AD 60 St. Paul was shipwrecked on Malta and it was then that Christianity was brought to the island. The church was built in 1570 and has some really interesting artifacts including bones from the Saint's wrist and part of the column that he was beheaded on from Rome.

After a few hours of sightseeing we decided that it was time for cocktails and made our way to Strait Street.  Originally this was the place where sailors on shore leave would party, it then became more of a bohemian hang out and was referred as "The Gut". Now, this 5-block long street, and at times not much more than an ally, is the location for bars.We chose the Kennedy Bar and had really great drinks, service and some average bar snacks. 

Afterwards we walked to the south end of Strait Street and had some lovely G&T's alongside delicious pintxos at Yard 32. They have an amazing collection of gins here! Unfortunately they only had outside seating available at the time and it was getting pretty chilly so we only stayed for one round. But I'd go back to both of these cocktail spots!

The next morning was sunny and soooo warm! I headed out solo to explore the area of Birgu which is where our marina was and also where the Fort Saint Angelo is located. It was a nice stroll pass many super yachts on the way to the fort. 

The fort was the Order of St John's headquarters during the Great Siege of Malta of 1565, but the location has had buildings on it since medieval times. It's an interesting walk around to see the old cannons and to take in the gorgeous views. The upper level is by far the prettiest with the palace and a little chapel. 

I continued to explore Birgu by walking up a VERY steep set of stairs to the main square area. Birgu is absolutely charming so even if you aren't staying in the area, I'd highly suggest spending an afternoon here!

I was starving after all my walking around so I stopped for a quick bite of ftira, a traditional circular Maltese sourdough bread, which is used in sandwiches like a baguette. Then I met everyone for a proper lunch at the terrace of one of the restaurants right at the marina.

It was our last night on the boat and we all wanted to enjoy every bit of it! We started happy hour a tad early and finished off the champagne while enjoying the gorgeous sunset. We had gotten incredibly lucky with the weather in Malta!

That night we had a very good dinner at d' Centre, outside in their very cute courtyard. Bonus that it was just a short walk from our boat. 

Forest and I got up early the next morning, grabbed a dghajsa water taxi, and made our way to St John's Co-Cathedral in Valletta as we hadn't had time to visit when we were there before. Built in 1572, this was the church that the Knights held communal worship in. As soon as we entered I was floored by the opulence!

We picked up an audio guide and went through the 8 chapels, one for each branch of the Order of the Knights. The floor is laid with hundreds of marble tombstones, they cover the entire floor of the cathedral and each is a commemoration of a Knight of the Order.

Every square inch of the cathedral is decorated, gilded, carved, painted, sculpted, etc. It's an amazing sight!

Before we left we made sure to go to the Oratory and check out Caravaggio's "The Beheading of St. John". WOW.

I was so glad we made the effort to go thru St John’s Co-Cathedral, I would absolutely suggest this is a do-not-miss while in Malta. 

We got back to the boat in time to say goodby to Brian and Anne and then Thibault and I went and picked up one last order of pastizzi for lunch.

The next 24 hours were all travel. We had a 3 hour flight from Malta to Orly airport in Paris where I said goodbye to Forest and Thibault. My flight to Seattle wasn't until the morning and it was out of CDG. The US was still requiring a negative Covid test to enter so I took a Uber to the Moxy at CDG (for €100!). I had used some Marriott points for the room and had brought my own proctor assisted Covid test. It was a relief when it was negative and I knew I could return home the next day.

My flight home was suppose to have been on British Air but they had to cancel and reschedule me because their crew had Covid! I flew Business Class on American to DFW which was quite a bit nicer that the BA flight I took to Paris originally. My seat 5A was its own pod with lots of storage and very comfortable lie-flat bed. Good thing as it was 10 hours to DFW. My connecting flight was delayed 3 hours which made for a long day! I had First Class on the flight to Seattle but couldn't tell you how it was as I was asleep as soon as I sat down. Unfortunately my suitcase didn't join me back home for 2 days! That's travel for you!

Not only was it fantastic to restart our annual New Year's Eve trip, and have new people join us, but Malta is an amazing destination. If you've considered it at all, I'd throw it to the top of your list! And if it hasn't been on your radar, I hope it is now!

All photos from Malta here:

Other posts from this trip:

Country Count #51 Malta

All Around Gozo

New Years Eve in Malta

Welcome to Paradise; Turks & Caicos

Trip date: November 2019

As is the norm for people in Seattle during the winter, I wanted to go someplace warm and sunny over Thanksgiving. My friend Gail had an Alaska Air companion fare that was expiring and wanted to use it. She also mentioned that she had wanted to go to the Turks and Caicos since another friend of ours had gone. 

I didn't really know too much about these islands except that my brother had been and had told me the beaches were amazing. I didn't really need much more convincing than that! We booked round trip flights to Fort Lauderdale and decided to spend one night on Miami Beach on the way down.

The trip started out on a high note as we were upgraded to First Class! That always helps to take the sting out of having to get up early. We took an Uber from FLL to the AC Marriott Miami Beach. We barely had time to change and then we were back in an Uber heading to The Surf Club for dinner. 

Thomas Keller's restaurant, inside the Four Seasons Hotel, is full on old school glamour. There was a champagne cart, tableside Cesar Salad, servers in beautiful suits. We were thrilled! Gail's pasta was accompanied by a waiter carrying a wooden box, inside was a white truffle which he then shaved an obscene amount onto her plate. I had lobster thermidor which was insanely rich and decadent.

Afterwards we had nightcaps in The Champagne Bar. It was a pretty luxurious evening and I'd happily do it all over again! 

It was a 1 ½ hour flight on American from Miami to Providenciales Island, also known as Provo. We actually almost missed the flight as we were enjoying some margaritas at the airport; the very last people to board! We took a taxi from the airport to our hotel the The Sands at Grace Bay for about $40 (even though Turks is a British Territory they use the US Dollar, go figure). 

We had booked a 2-bedroom ocean view unit at the 4-star resort and we were ready to get a tropical drink and hit the pool! Except when I went to the desk and gave them my name to check in they told me they'd be right back with the manager. Not a good sign.

Long story short, they had overbooked the hotel. But they were putting us up at their sister property the 5-star The Palms for the same price. After a bit of negotiating they actually put us in a 2000 square foot owner's suite; 2 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and ocean views from the living room, kitchen, and dining room. The suite normally goes for $2500 per night! We had to wait quite a while to get into the room however as the owner had just left after being there for a month so they had a lot of cleaning to do. I also negotiated that we each got $100 credit at the swim-up bar since that's where we would be hanging out until it was ready. It was absolutely ridiculous!

We spent the next six days completely giddy about our fancy suite with uninterrupted views of the ocean. When hot tub conversations with other vacationers turned hoity toity we pointed to our suite and watched their jaws drop. LOL!!

Gail made friends with one of the pool-girls and every morning she had our loungers made up and waiting for us. Our daily schedule was made up of morning beach walks, breakfast buffet (included with our room) outside at the hotel's garden patio, and then the entire day by the pool or on the beach. 

The sand on Grace Bay beach is absolutely unbelievable. It's incredibly white and as fine as talc powder. There was rarely anything washed up on the beaches and when you walked out in the water the bottom was smooth and felt like clay. It was everything I had imagined!

As the day grew longer, Gail and I would move to the hottub and visit with the other guests. Most seemed to be from the East Coast, especially New Jersey.

The resort had a little shack on the beach serving cocktails where most people, including us, gathered around nightly for the spectacular sunsets. 

This was such a great trip! Absolutely relaxing, no running around (we did go out a bit which I'll write about next), just a gorgeous resort with wonderful service. Highly recommend!

If you are looking into traveling to the gorgeous Turks and Caicos, you can find information and updates about COVID-19 related news here. 

Part two of Turks & Caicos trip here. All photos here.

Return to Lima

Trip date: January 2019

Our big Peru adventure was coming to an end, we had flown back to Lima from Cusco, and were staying at the Inkari Luxury Hotel in the lovely Miraflores neighborhood. I have a theory that if a hotel has a descriptive name, it's usually the opposite experience (Comfort Inn/not comfortable!, Holiday Inn/that carpet does not a holiday make!) And the Inkari Luxury proved my theory. Not horrible but just enough fake luxury to make me annoyed. With so many well priced hotels in Lima I'd look elsewhere next time. You're welcome.

We dropped our bags and headed directly to Mayo Bar for cocktails. Chef Virgilio Martínez moved his famous Central restaurant into a stunning new complex in the Barranco district and just recently opened Mayo and another new restaurant Kjolle in the same space.

The drinks were very interesting, and incorporated ingredients from different parts of Peru. My drink, for example, was to represent the sea and had sea lettuce in it! We also had some casual bar food (suckling goat!) that was delicious if not overly rich.

We'd had a long day, both sightseeing in the Sacred Valley and traveling, so we headed back to the hotel where Forest and I taught the bartender to make a passable martini.

The next morning we made a quick stop at a grocery store for interesting things to bring home and then walked to a very cool shop called Dedalo back over in the Barranco. This place was amazing! There are a bunch of small rooms inside housing different artists' & designers' works. Everything you could want from jewelry, to clothes, to pottery, etc is here and everything is handmade. There is also a great outdoor patio cafe where you can get a beverage and a snack. Highly recommend this shop while in Lima!

The neighborhood is very nice to walk around in also, lots of old houses with very colonial design. It's definitely a hip and trendy area of town.

We were starving so made our way to our lunch destination Isolina, currently number (lucky?) 13 on the World's 50 Best list. We hadn't really planned this one well as we realized it was a Sunday afternoon and 1/2 of Lima was lined up for a table at the no-reservations restaurant. We put our name in and had a couple of pisco sours at a random spot a few doors down (which were delicious btw!)

After an hour we went to check in only to be told it would be another 30 minutes. We opted for another round of pisco sours, this time from the restaurant and served to us on the sidewalk.

We were finally seated after 2 hours of waiting! And we were famished! Luckily we had had time to peruse the menu and were able to order the minute our asses hit the chairs. Everything was absolutely delicious, especially the ceviche and the crispy pork ribs. I'd highly recommend but maybe work your timing out better than we did!

Caitlin had to dash for the airport and Thibault decided to head back to the hotel for a swim, leaving Forest and I up to our own devices. It took us all of about 5 minutes to decide to head back to Bar Ingles, which we'd visited when first in Lima 1 1/2 weeks earlier.

Thibault, Forest, and I set out the next morning to explore the Old Town. We had our Uber driver drop us off at Plaza San Martin, where the city's first hotel still stands. If you get up close to the woman on the statue you will see a tiny alpaca perched on her head!

We walked up the pedestrian only Jiron de la Union where honestly there isn't much to see until you get to the Iglesia de la Merced. The church is as old as the city and held Lima's first ever mass.

Besides the pretty alter, and impressive and funny Christmas manger scene they had constructed, the church also is home to a large silver cross that once belonged to Father Pedro Urraca who was known to have visions of the Virgin Mary. Worshippers were lined up to place a hand on the cross in hopes of receiving a miracle.

Next, we came into the Plaza de Mayor, the birthplace of Lima. It is huge and absolutely gorgeous! On one side is the cathedral and Archbishop's Palace. The Government's Palace is at the far end. The pretty fountain in the center use to be the city's gallows! That would make for a really different Instagram!

 

Businesses, shops, and restaurants are housed in grand yellow buildings on the other 2 sides. It's really one of the most beautiful squares I've seen!

It was also very hot! So after splitting up for a bit to explore the square on our own, we met back up at the Museo del Pisco bar for, you guessed it, a pisco sour! It's a cute little bar, just steps from the square, which made it a great spot for a sit down.

For our last lunch in Peru we decided to try some traditional roast chicken, Pollo a la Brasa. There are many, many "fast food" style places selling this most popular dish in Peru. We chose to go to Pardo's which was close to us and was a restaurant with outside seating. Their chicken gets marinaded in a tangy bath with 10-15 different spices and then is spit roasted. The skin is very crispy and the chicken is very juicy. What's not to love?

Then we headed back to the Museo del Pisco as we had learned while having a drink there that they do pisco tastings. It was very fun and interesting to have the bartender take us through the history of pisco, the distillation process, and taste through a few different styles.

We headed back to our neighborhood to do a bit of shopping before hitting the pool at our hotel for a refreshing dip.

My flight wasn't until 1am so I had one last dinner, unfortunately it was a Monday and many restaurants were closed. We opted to go back to Kennedy park and ended up at a cafe next to where we had been before. I had one last meal of cuy and we also tried the skewers of beef heart which are popular in Peru. There was also a stand in the park selling the picarones, fried donuts made of sweet potato, so we got to try those too!

I had arranged a driver to take me to the airport, which was strangely extremely busy at 11pm! I was on American Airlines in business class so I went to wait in the lounge but the line to get in was so long I skipped it! The cabin and seats were fine but again, as on my LATAM flight into Peru, not at the same level of business class flights as other airlines. I mainly took advantage of the lay flat bed and slept.

I had a 2+ hour layover in Dallas and then was in 1st class on American back up to Seattle which I had cashed some miles in for. On my way home I rode on the Alaska Way Viaduct for the last time, it would close 3 days later and be torn down! Crazy!

Getting to see so many sides of Peru, from the big city of Lima, to the remote & dangerous Amazon jungle, to the ancient wonders of the Sacred Valley, was an amazing way to learn more about this country. And a great bucket list experience!

All Lima photos here.

Other posts from this trip:
24 Hours Miami
Lima City of Kings
Welcome to the Jungle
Piranhas and Pink Dolphins
Ringing in 2019 in the Amazon
The Sacred Valley of the Incas
Discovering Machu Picchu
Dining at 11700 Feet
Cusco Daytrip

Paris in August

Trip date: August 2017

After my week long holiday in the Southwest of France, I stayed with Forest and Thibault for another quick two days before flying home. But I can do a lot in two days!

Day One, Forest and I set out for a very special exhibit at The Musée des Arts Décoratifs. 70 Years of Dior was an amazing collection of over 300 gowns from all the designers who have led the haute couture house; Christian Dior, Yves Saint Laurent, Marc Bohan, Gianfranco Ferré, John Galliano, Raf Simons, and Maria Grazia Chiuri.

Additionally, there were displays of shoes, handbags, jewelry, perfume. And an amazing collection of photos and ad campaigns, as well as magazine covers.

They even had a mini atelier set up and showed how they go about making patterns. It was really an event that overwhelmed my senses in a great way.  We spent a couple of hours going through everything, marveling at the craftsmanship, the elegance, and the style. It was awesome to be able to see so much of the House's work.

We discussed it all in detail over a wonderful lunch at Ellsworth after. We each took the 3-course menu; I chose the roasted marrow bones for my starter which were absolutely the best I have ever had!

While walking from the restaurant enroute to our next stop, we passed a cute little boutique hotel called The Drawing Hotel and had a quick drink on their small back terrace. It seemed to be a very nice 4-star hotel, with a great location in the 1st, if you are looking to stay in that area.

Our actual destination however was the Crillon Hotel, which had just reopened after a 4-year renovation, and their bar, Les Ambassadeurs. The hotel is located at Place du Concorde and its facade was originally commissioned in 1755 by King Louis XV. A mansion was finally built behind the facade and the Count of Crillon purchased it in 1788. In 1906 it was sold and turned into a hotel. That's some pedigree!

It's swanky as hell and the service was very proper but not stuffy. I just loved it! There is also a beautiful looking bistro with interior courtyard seating adjacent. The hotel is worth a stop, even to check out the amazing floral displays in the lobby. But if you're there anyway, why not a glass of champagne in the bar?  And by the way, if you book a room here, you get your very own butler. So call me and I'll drop by!

We had another new spot to check out, over at the Palais Tokyo, where Les Grand Verres had recently been opened by the team behind Candalaria. The space is very industrial chic, and the drink menu focuses on being sustainable and creating minimal waste. Drinks and snacks were great, and you can't beat the location, right on the Seine!

That evening we met Thibault and a few other friends at Duc Lombards, one of the main jazz clubs in the city. We had an absolutely great time sitting up in the balcony, listening to jazz, and sharing many bottles of wine!

Day Two, Forest and I had a delicious lunch at the one-Michelin starred Neige d'ete in the 15th arrondissement. For €76 we had 4 courses with wine pairings and amuses to start.

I chose to add Sevruga caviar to my Whitefish beignet (as you do) for another €25 and we shared a cheese course before dessert for another €12.

The wine pairings were all excellent, as was the service. It's a beautiful space, done in barely-there greys and whites. I'd highly recommend it.

After lunch we did a little shopping, stopping into the Maison de l'Escargot (just down the street) and then over to the 7th to the Maison du Whisky. Shopping completed I was looking forward to a glass of wine at L'avant Comptoir (one of my most fave spots in Paris) but they were having electrical issues and had to close.

We headed to Montparnasse and decided to do a crawl of the grande dame bistros. First stop was Le Dome, which is absolutely gorgeous inside. Multiple rooms, as well as a glassed-in terrace, are decked out lavishly. I could only imagine it back in its heyday.

Across the street we had a drink at Le Rotonde, where art and mirrors line the walls and the red and amber lighting gives a theatrical feel to the space.

We finished up at Le Select, outside on their patio. It's so fun to imagine the various celebrities (and celebrity wannabes) who ate and drank at these old haunts. The year before we did a big lunch at La Coupole and drinks after at La Closerie des Lilas. Next time I'm in the area I'll try to hit Rosebud. So much fun!

Thibault met up with us for dinner at near by Les Fauves, a super cute and bustling restaurant with really good food.

And then it was home to pack :(

My American flight left CdG at noon, and I was lucky with the 3-seat row all to myself. I had a small layover in Chicago where I chowed down on some queso fundido and a margarita! Love France, but a girl needs her Mexican too!

All photos of Paris here.

Previous post on this trip:
Summer in Southwest France