Day 53 Goodbye Valletta, off to Munich

We packed up our stuff this morning so we could see a few more places before checking out.

What a great trip for our crabby honeymoon!

We went for mass at St. Paul's Shipwreck Church but it was ending so we were directed to St. Augustine's Church 4 blocks away. I think you can find a mass all day long and the two we attended each had over 100.

Everywhere in Valletta this applies:

Unfortunately, our next destination, the Palace State Rooms, was closed, so we went down the street to a private home. Casa Rocca Piccola was built by a Knight when Valletta was built in 1530. When Napoleon kicked them out in 1800, he sold their property to pay the Maltese who enlisted in his army and the house still is occupied by the family who bought it. It is so full of antiques and heirloom treasures that you have to see it to believe it. Our pictures just scratch the surface.

Slippers from three Popes, gifts to the Knights:

This reminded us of our back house furnishings:

The basement of the house was opened to an underground cavern that was hewed from solid rock and utilizes an old cistern connected to 15th century tunnels to make a very secure bomb shelter. Almost 40% of the city's buildings were destroyed in the 157 day saturation bombing by the Axis when as many as 8 waves of aircraft a day made the run from Sicily only 60 miles away. It's a miracle they held on! It was a good summary of Malta - people who survive despite multiple invasions (or attempts) and who thrive.

Don’t worry, we were in no danger:

It was time to leave, but we decided to adapt like the Maltese to circumstances. During the last 2 weeks the Greek government and the EU have been trying to work out a second payment to forestall Greek default. The public sector employees are not happy with the measures the government has taken to reduce the deficit and have been demonstrating. So Wednesday and Thursday they went on strike, public transportation was shut down including the airport, and tourist sites were even closed. The protests turned violent- stones and street pavers vs tear gas and water cannons. The BBC showed all that in Athens, so we decided to change plans - why walk into problems. So we switched to Munich, Germany, because there was a direct flight, we've never been there, their government is stable, and it is relatively close to our last stop, Geneva.
 
We arrived in a cool rainy Munich but the warmth of the people made up for that. The airport info desk told us the train was much cheaper, a transit employee showed us how to buy ticket and put us on the right train, a young couple on the train made sure we knew where to get off, a man exiting with us took us to the correct street and so we got to the Regent Hotel. Tomorrow we see Munich.