Our final Gozo walk on Sunday morning stretched into a five hour hike over the cliffs at the northern end of Malta's sister island. This part is also rich in natural heritage as well as ancient cultural additions to the landscape. Once again our guide was John Mizzi and his way of expressing this intermingling of culture and nature is "Feel the energy!"
We set off from Dwejra, a tiny village built around a small inland cove that connects to the Mediterranean sea through a tunnel. I visited this area last year when I stayed in Gharb with my brother and his family. He and my niece went out on one of the little boats that take people through the tunnel to explore the caves and natural arches. My brother and I also went snorkeling along the fault line drop-off here. Fungus rock and Crocodile rock are internationally known as scuba-diving sites and Fungus rock was protected by the knights of Malta because of the plant that grows there and is reputed to have medicinal properties.
We climbed up over the globigerina cliffs at the back of the small chapel. Here there are good examples of the enigmatic cart ruts that are found throughout Malta and Gozo. We also noticed that the limestone we were walking over was peppered with fossilised sea shells. When we reached the garigue, there was plenty of Maltese spurge and edible plants for John to demonstrate survival techniques! There was even a small meadow of yellow jonquils.
After walking along the headlands with the sea on our left, we dropped down into a valley with an irrigation stream running quite strongly. The valley ends at a cliff so when there is a big wet season, there is a waterfall into the sea. As we climbed up the globigerina limestone cliffs on the opposite side, John showed us a small cave that he thought was carved out in the bronze age. It was certainly man-made but some of the more sceptical ramblers thought it was more likely to be a fisherman's cave. Malta has such a tradition of re-cycling that my own feeling is that it has been carved thousands of years ago and re-used through the centuries.
We continued on along several headlands, dropping down into the valleys between. At one valley, a small group of ramblers left us to walk up the valley and back to their cars to catch the earlier ferry back to Malta, but most people stayed to continue on to San Dimitri. On several of the headlands along here there are piles and circles of coralline blocks of stone which John thinks are undocumented temples. The photo that heads the post is of one of these sites.
I stumbled on one of these temples when I walked down a country road from Gharb on last year's visit to Gozo. It was this road that we walked up to complete the circle and return to Dwijra. We stopped at a small chapel that I had visited before and John told the tale of a hermit priest who lived by the chapel and had a son who was abducted by pirates. I'm not sure about the rest of the tale but I have made a note to start exploring the myths and legends of Malta and Gozo.
After touching the outskirts of San Dimitri, we walked back out to the cliff edge and completed the circuit walking back along the headlands with the sea on our right. I was dawdling at the rear as we dropped back down into Dwejra and my lift had already started the car and was heading towards me. We had a bit of a race to the ferry and missed the 2.30 but got into the queue for the 3.00 o-clock. I had a lift all the way back to Birkikarra where my hosts offered me tea in their lovely big house and I changed cars to go with another of the ramblers who lives at Marsascala. She dropped me off at Paula to catch the Marsaxlokk bus home. Once again, I felt a surge of happiness at the wonder of the Maltese landscape and the warmth of the Maltese people.
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