Naxxar to Fort Madlena

The photo is of fire buckets in the entrance of Fort Madlena.  

The Malta Ramblers walk yesterday met at the parish church in Naxxar.  This was my first visit to Naxxar and the bus seemed to be re-routed because of some hold-up on the outskirts of the town so it was close to 2.00pm when I got to the steps of the church and was greeted by Dr Gunter.  I had rushed things a bit leaving Marsaxlokk so hadn't managed to have lunch but I brought some Maltese bread with tomato and tuna with me so I sat on the steps to eat as the large crowd gathered for the walk to Fort Madlena.

Naxxar is another town I have made a note to re-visit.  The church is very elaborate from the outside and next to it is Palazzo Parisio and gardens now the home of the Marquis Scicluna family.  When we set of walking through the streets of Naxxar we passed interesting old houses, a curious looking tower and an old windmill converted.  

Our first stop was Ghargur where we stopped on the steps of another medieval chapel.  Dr Gunter pronounced the G in Ghargur and I later learned that this is the anglicised way of pronouncing what should be spoken as Arroor.  We walked along a road from where we had a good view down the valley to Bahar ic-Caghaq and along part of the Victoria lines, a British line of fortification that runs across Malta.  The Ramblers are planning a 7 hour walk along the length of the Victoria lines later in February and I will try and get my name down for this restricted walk.

We rounded a bend and saw a very large apartment development that runs down a whole side of the valley at Madlena.  I learnt from Sylvia who I met some time ago at the Mosta natural environment course that her husband used to ride his bike around these parts when there was nothing there but fields.  Just below the apartments, the road curves over an attractive old arched bridge.

We climbed up the Madlena side of the valley and then turned off to the right to double back to Fort Madlena.  The countryside is looking great just now and the wild fennel is coming into bloom as well as the almond trees.  Dr Gunter had arranged for us to have a guided tour of the fort with one of the volunteers who form part of the St John Rescue Corps.  The Corps, under the auspices of the most venerable order of the Hospital of St John of Jerusalem, use the old British fort which is part of the Victoria lines as their Headquarters and Training School.  They also help to maintain the fort and have put out an information leaflet for Saturday afternoon visitors.

The fort was built in the late 19th century and was dug into the top of the hill for additional fortification.  There are some points as we walked around where I think I could detect some of the layers of rock that were talked about at the Maltese natural heritage course on Wednesday.

It was intended as a heavy-gun fort to guard potential landing points at Salina, St Paul's Bay and Mellieha but the era of invasion by sea was coming to an end, and the cost of firing large guns was so prohibitive that they were rarely used.

The views from the gun emplacements are of course excellent and I noticed several yachts and other small boats taking advantage of the keyhole of sunny weather we were enjoying.  I learnt that the stone surrounds of the gun emplacements used to be painted for camouflage, green in the wet season and brown in the dry season.

By the time we had completed the tour of the fort we were running out of time to return to Naxxar by a circular route and so we walked back the way we had come.  I was glad to meet up with Sylvia and her husband, Malcolm, again and they were able to give me a lift back to Marsaxlokk so I got home before it was dark and in time to start preparing for my trip to Catania tomorrow.  

I have arranged to be picked up at 5.15am to join the Catania group at the airport in the morning so this will be my last post until next weekend.