Start the day with a paddle.

Saturday dawned beautifully, I suppose. The sun was quite high when I first saw it. The sky was blue the sea was that stunning Mediterranean turquoise, the wind light to non existent. The water was a flat as a dab and spreading uniformly across the kitchen floor.

The first job of the day was to put the washing machine on. That wasn't my job and I didn't do it. No, my job was to make the first coffee of the day. And the second. However, having filled and turned on the kettle I made my way to the balcony for a gawp at the stunningly blue vista spread before me. The click of the kettle caused me to turn and wander towards it. Coffee makings prepared, organised and ready all that was left was to traverse the steadily spreading pond between the kettle an me.

Had I been wearing slippers I may not have noticed but I wasn't and I did. Just as well. Fortunately the kettle had boiled as the electric went awol and the water continued to flow. At least, I noted, the floors are perfectly level.

At times like this cold calculations are needed and definitive actions need undertaking so I hollered and made the coffee. Bath towels formed a coffer dam around the washing machine and the spreading suds were contained. I dragged the machine out of it's bay into it's sea and established that the fault lay inside.

We have a caretaker called "Felix" who I called and appraised of the situation.
15 minutes later he was there with a lady who had mops and energy. He restored the electricity and she restored the floors.

It may take longer to restore the washing machine, I think.

So, two coffees later we caught the bus to Sliema ferry and wandered to Tigne Point, a shopping complex of hideous design occupying the site formerly known as Dragut Point, this being where Dragut the Corsair in the pay of Suliman landed in May 1565. Had he landed in April the moslem hordes may well have overrun Malta. He didn't and the moslem in charge of Suliman's fleet, Piale, had fallen out with the moslem in charge of his land forces, Mustafa, which was not ideal in the circumstances. Dragut got them on the same side but the die had been cast, the planned plan not as effectively executed as it ought to have been with the result that Jean Parisot de la Vallette, Grand Master of the Knights Hospitallers was better able to plan, prepare and execute his defensive strategy, ably assisted by his main man Sir Oliver Starkey, the only non Grand Master to be buried in the Cathedral.

So, we stood in the winter of 2015 where Dragut stood in the summer of 1565 but instead of looking across at Mount Sciberras and Mustafa's numerous canons we looked at Valletta, begun by and named after the victorious commander. A worthy place for one so courageous and determined.

Valletta from Dragut Point, Saturday 9th January 2016. Between coffee's #2 and #3.