This morning we had planned to go to Gozo but when we arrived at the Fast Ferry terminal we were told that they were not going to Gozo because of the rough sea conditions. This flummoxed us a little bit so we had to think about what else we could do.

After some discussion we decided that as we had all our swimming stuff with us we may as well go and visit one of the beaches in the north of the island. After a bit of searching on google we decided to catch the bus to Ghajn Tuffieha.

This morning, rather than climb up the steps we decided to get the lift into the city centre. The lift is 58m tall and it takes about 23 seconds to make the journey.

We had to get the bus from Floriana this time and as we got to the bus stop our bus was just pulling away. The next bus was due in 20 minutes but for some reason that never turned up, so we ended up waiting around an hour for the bus.

We got off at the nearest bus stop which was around a 15 minute walk to the beach. The beach looked stunning.

We hired a couple of deck chairs and then went for a dip in the sea. The water was quite chilly but once you got swimming it felt good. We swam out to the far rocks at the side of the bay. The current was quite strong so it took a bit longer to swim back.

After a very unhealthy lunch of chips and beer we sunbathed for a bit longer before getting back into the water and swimming to the rocks on the other side of the bay. The weather was a bit changeable- one minute sunny and the next very cloudy and threatening rain.

Once it started to get too cloudy to sunbathe we decided to call it a day and go for a walk instead. It was a long climb back up all the steps.

At the top was another one of the coastal watch towers.

From where we were you could see down onto Golden Beach. This was a lot busier than the beach we had been on and it didn’t look as nice.

We took some posing photos anyway as the background was nice.

As it was still earlish afternoon we decided to get the bus and go and visit the Mosta Dome. There were road works on the bus route so we ended up going past the dome and we had to take a short walk back.

As we queued up to get in it started to rain, but luckily the queue was very short. The Mosta Dome is also known as the Basillica of the Assumption of Our Lady and is a Roman Catholic church The design of the church is based on the Pantheon in Rome and it has the third largest unsupported dome in the world.

Once we were inside we climbed up the winding stairs to the middle section of the church. From here you could see the two bell towers for which this church is known alongside the iconic columns making up the portico.

From this level you got some amazing views of the inside of the dome.

We made our way back down the stairs and just stood under the dome. The structure of the building is amazing. The base walls are around 8m thick so they can support the dome and the dome is around 59m high with an outside circumference of around 55m.

The present day church was actually built around an original smaller church, which remained in use throughout the construction of the dome. The church took around 28 years to build and many of the residents helped to build it on Sundays and public holidays. Once the stonework for the current church was completed the older church was dismantled within a week.

The main painting which shows Our Lady being taken to heaven was a painting that was in the original church. However, in 1860 the original rectangular painting was enlarged by extending the sky section upwards. The sides of the painting were slightly reduced meaning two of the apostles had part of their backs removed. This was done so it better fitted the new structure.

One of the most interest g stories about the Mosta Dome happened during WWI. On 9 April 1942 three bombs hit the church and two of these deflected without exploding. The third one penetrated the dome and landed in the middle of the church where around 300 people were gathered. The bomb did not explode and was defused and dumped into the sea. A replica of the bomb can be found in the church.

Because of its strategic location, Malta became one of the most bombed places on earth during WWII. 6,700 tons of bombs fell in just six weeks. Because of this.the people of Malta were awarded the George Cross in 1942.

After leaving the dome we visited the nearby WWII shelter. The shelter wasn’t particularly large but had displays from some of the local tradespeople who would have used the shelter.

By the evening the weather had improved a little bit so we ventured back out into Valletta to find somewhere to eat.

We ended back at D’Office restaurant, mainly because you could sit outside but were under cover. And it was lucky we had that protection as whilst we were eating it did rain.