Episode 02: 3 Walks Around Valletta

Valletta is a very walkable city. All three of our walks around Valletta could be done in a day if you want to see all the main sights quickly. Or you could spread them out, linger a little, go into some of the places we pass by and get a really good knowledge of all things Valletta. Take a street map with you and you should be able to follow the routes easily. As ever there is much more detail on the podcast. Also, we’ll be coming back to lots of the places mentioned in future episodes.

walks around valetta 01: the City Centre

Start in Castille Square where you can admire stunning views over the Grand Harbour, the statues around the square – former prime ministers and what-not – and the Auberge de Castille, one of the city’s most beautiful buildings. The auberges – there were originally 8 in Valletta – were built by the Knights Templar, although the baroque façade on this one was added later. It’s a government building, so you can’t go in, but you’ll probably want to photograph its wide steps, pillared entrance, decorative canons and fluttering Maltese flag.

Valletta V statue and Our Lady of Victory Church

Walk down to nearby Victory Square, where you can pause at the statue of Jean de Valete, the founder of the city, and perhaps pop into the Our Lady of Victories, the oldest church in the city. It was built by the Knights in thanksgiving for their victory over the Ottomans who tried to invade the island in 1565 and is dedicated to the Virgin Mary, hence the frescoes inside showing scenes of her life.

Merchant Street, or Triq Il-Merkanti in Maltese, leads off Victory Square and not far down on the left is another auberge, the Italian one this time, which is now the national art gallery. It’s free to go into the pretty courtyard, where you’ll a better idea of how these imposing buildings were designed. Further down Merchant Street, you could take a little detour past – or into! – St Paul’s Shipwreck Church, whose interior is a feast of crimson and gold. Inside you’ll find various memorials to the saint who was shipwrecked on Malta, including the pillar on which he was beheaded and a gold reliquary, said to contain fragments of his wrist bone.

Further down Merchant Street, take a left towards St George’s Square, scene of many national celebrations and parades, and home to the Grand Master’s Palace, built by the Knights in 1571. The dark green balconies all across the façade have been copied for buildings all over the island, but these are the originals. Look out for the two plaques featuring thank you messages to the people of Malta for their resilience in World War II, one from King George – who awarded the island the George Cross – and one from President Roosevelt.

Until 2015, this was Malta’s parliament building. Today the palace is the office of the President of Malta, but the public can usually visit. Inside, there’s an impressive marble corridor running right around the 4 sides of the building, with a variety of very grand rooms running off it. Think, for example, Throne Room (red and gold), Grand Council Chamber (gold and more gold, plus the Maltese and EU flags) and an armoury, full, full, full of weapons, from swords to guns and canons, and a couple of life-sized mounted knights in splendid armour.

Valletta Memorial to Daphne Caruana Galicia

Leaving St George’s Square along Republic Street will take you past the statue of Queen Victoria erected to celebrate her Golden Jubilee in 1891, and an empty plinth left by an artist asking questions about the need for royalty. The vintage Café Jubilee opposite is a famed spot for cakes and pastries. Further down on the left is the memorial to the murdered journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia, whose story will follow in a later episode, and then comes St John’s Co-Cathedral. Its imposing, but rather plain façade gives little hint of the marble and gilded splendour within or of the artistic treasures it holds, the highlights being two Caravaggio paintings, including the enormous Beheading of St John the Baptist.

The last section of this first walk takes you further down Republic Street, to an area re-designed in the 2010s by the architect Renzo Piano: he reconfigured the ruins of the Old Opera House – badly bombed in World War II – to create open-air theatre, he designed the new Parliament buildings, a chamber and an admin block, both built of local limestone and the new City Gate, a huge, minimalist archway leading over the old moat into Independence Square, dominated by the central Triton Fountains. Here, you are no longer in Valletta, but in neighbouring Floriana.

walks around valetta 02: floriana and the waterfront

Just near the Triton Fountain you’ll find 3 impressive memorials: the Independence Monument, erected in 1989 to mark the 25th anniversary of Malta’s independence, the towering Commonwealth Air Forces memorial, topped by a golden eagle, which lists the names of 2,300 pilots from Commonwealth countries killed in action and the National War Memorial where an eternal flame burns. Also nearby is St Publius Church, named after the first Bishop of Malta, an early Christian convert who was appointed to his role by St Paul himself.

Valletta Waterfront is a short walk away, the place where the cruise ships arrive, and where the old warehouses have been turned into restaurants, but have retained their coloured doors – red, blue, yellow, green – which told sailors which goods should be stored where. From there, a short walk along Lascaris Wharf will take you to the lift to Upper Barraka Gardens, where you get stunning views of the Grand Harbour and can find plaques recording such moments of history as the Malta Conference of 1948, attended by Churchill, Roosevelt and Stalin. Also here is a plaque ‘In memory of the Soldiers, Sailors, Marine, Airmen, Coast Guardsmen and Merchant Mariners who fought to preserve Malta’s freedom during World War II’.

From here, you can exit the gardens back into Castille Square where the first walk began.

walks around valetta 03: the St Elmo Peninsula

Valletta Lower Barrakka Gardens view from

Use a map – perhaps the free one from the tourist office – to help you find the footpath which leads around the back of Fort St Elmo. Start on the western end, wander round enjoying gorgeous coastal views and then pop into Fort St Elmo, built by the Knights in 1552 in preparation for the expected Turkish invasion. Today, it’s the site of the National War Museum, telling the story of Malta from the Bronze Age to World War II, but you can walk around outside the museum for no cost and get a sense of the terrain where the momentous battles were fought in the 16th century.

Continuing along the footpath will bring you to the Lower Barrakka Gardens – more great sea views! – and the Siege Bell Monument, opened in 1992 on the 50th anniversary of Malta being awarded the George Cross. It stands in honour of the 7,000 servicemen and women and civilians killed in Malta during the Second World War and its bell tolls at noon every day. From here, it’s a short hop back to Merchant Street and the city centre.