Our home here is “Saveria House”a 300-year old Maltese limestone house of three floors. A terrace open to the sky is on the third floor roof and looks down on our short walk alley.
The alley has an Malteze name, Sqaq Nru. We are at 7 Triq Santa Lucija in the village of Naxxar (Nash-ar) on the island country of Malta, in the Mediterranean Sea between Sicily and Tunisia.
Travel has its delightful surprises like horses on the country roads from the airport. But when we arrived yesterday late in the afternoon, our bags did not. Evidently they were enjoying the rain and fog at Heathrow. They arrive today at 7 pm, driven to our door by Air Malta.
Another, more humorous, surprise was the height of the doorways in our house. Dana must bend at the waist to pass through.
Why, you may reasonably ask, would a 6′ 4′ American rent a house with 5′ door jams. Because when no one is standing in the doorways in the Trip Advisor rental site photo, they appear quite large. There is nothing to compare in size so your mind’s eye assumes the height is higher than normal if anything. Dana must take care if he is not to brain himself with a very hard header block of limestone.
But we are used to such surprises especially on arrival. Undaunted we headed out for dinner. We arrived at Cellini Wine Bar about two alleys down and around the corner just before opening. But the owner welcomed us and brought a bottle of a local Syrah and fizzy water.
By the time our soup arrived our delayed luggage and the vagaries of door frames were forgotten. Wine is a necessary travel companion for us. Then a delicious broccoli soup, caprese salad with fresh local mozzarella and fresh basil sprigs completed our first day.
We awoke to sunshine and a hibiscus in bloom on our neighbors bush across the alley. A promising beginning….
MedFlies 