Climbing Paradise

As well as being a fount of local knowledge, Andrew Warrington is the founder of the Malta Climbing Club, the longest established climbing club on the island. There are hundreds of routes here. Malta’s limestone cliffs, sea crags, and caves are ideal for sport climbing, trad and deep-water soloing, and Warrington has been responsible for opening up many of the spots. His latest project is a via ferrata route on the outskirts of the town of Mosta, which he wants me to experience.

He introduces me to his colleague, a northern Italian named Nicola, on the side of a busy main road. Expecting to jump in Nicola’s car, I’m surprised when he immediately hands me a helmet and harness and directs me to follow him over the guardrails. Within moments, we’re dropping down into a steep ravine full of carob and olive trees, where the sound of the road is replaced by the hum of insects. We begin our climb, guiding our hands up the metal rungs and cables on the shaded rock face.

Weather worn, the limestone has a brittle appearance but it feels reassuringly strong. There’s a hefty dose of exposure here—enough to keep me well-focussed—and it’s only when we eventually reach a ledge on the cliff that I’m able to stop and take in my surroundings. A tall stone wall rollercoasters down one side of the ravine and then up the other. I can see a set of steps carved into the opposite cliff, zig zagging up to some imposing fortifications. We’re right on the Victoria Lines, a series of defensive structures built by the British in the 19th century.

Leaving our climb and driving to our next location, the roadside is dotted with similar relics of warfare from over the ages, each one a reminder of what a prized possession this island has been. The most recent of the many conflicts fought here was the Second World War, when the island endured relentless bombing raids by German and Italian forces—to the point that it was, at one stage, the most bombed place on earth.

We arrive on Gozo, Malta’s much smaller neighbour, late in the evening after an easy 20-minute journey on the car ferry. Even in the dark, the place feels very different to Malta. The roads are quieter, narrower and twistier, while the amber glow of the occasional streetlight reveals glimpses of crumbling baroque-style buildings.

The next morning, rock climbing is on the agenda again—trad style this time. My guide is Didi, a veteran climber who grew up in East Germany. After a period spent mountaineering in the Himalayas, he visited Gozo for a holiday and quickly realised it had everything that a free and easy climber such as himself could ever want for.

“Welcome to my office,” Didi says as he leads us down into the deep scar of a ravine called Mgarr ix-Xini. Along the way, he points out each of the dozens of routes, many of which were created by the Royal Marines in the 1970s. “This was all full of shrub and weeds, like a jungle,” Didi explains. “I came down here with a pair of sheers and cleared it all out myself. Eventually I stopped and I said, f**k it, that’s enough— now I climb.”

We pause and he peers up at a rock face above us. “This is where I climbed. It’s called Didi’s First.” I try out a few simple routes with Didi and feel ashamed that such a climbing expert has to witness my terrible form. He shows the patience of a saint, of course. Eventually, I have a go at Didi’s First, which proves to be my last. My wrists are done and I’m climbed-out for the day. We make our way back to our cars via a staircase that had been painstakingly carved into the stone. “Did you create this Didi?” I ask. “Of course not,” he replies. “I’m not that stupid. It was probably the Brits.”

In the afternoon we meet Kevin Grech who has e-bikes waiting for us outside his garage. Grech, who looks remarkably like Pep Guardiola, was raised in Gozo, spent some time in Malta and then decided to return to the island to raise his young family. Over the next two hours he takes us on a whistle-stop tour through the Gozitan countryside, with its rabbit warren of dry stone walls and ancient terraces. In this evening light, the shadows lengthen across the olive groves and fields of cacti which, judging by the perfumed smell in the air, are in bloom.

We take a dirt track that teeters along huge white cliffs at Sanap on the island’s south coast then head uphill while Grech points out the wild asparagus, fennel and capers along the side of the road. At the top, we stop, and, on his insistence, I sample the stem of one of “the English plants”. It’s sharp and tastes surprisingly lemony and fresh. From this viewpoint, we can see all four sides of the island, each of which looks no more than a 15-minute bike ride away. “The best thing about Gozo is that you can always seek out the perfect coastal conditions,” Grech tells me. “There’s always a side that’s out of the wind, or that has the cleanest water for swimming or clearest water for snorkelling.”

The Final Whistle

My trip ends back on Malta with a revisit to a coastal lagoon at Ghar Lapsi. I’d passed it with Andrew Warrington earlier in the trip and had mentally bookmarked it as a place to come for a morning swim before my flight home. I ease into the clear water and swim slowly through it, reflecting on the last few days. What I’ve found on Malta and Gozo is a place that’s totally unique; it does have many of the familiarities of Britain, but those influences feed into a culture with many fascinating layers to it, all forged by the civilisations that have been drawn to this focal point in the Mediterranean over thousands of years.

I think back to a conversation Kevin Grech and I had during the previous day’s e-bike tour, about why he had decided to stay on Gozo. He put it into perspective with an unexpected analogy: Maltese football. Unlike other small nations like Iceland, the Faroe Islands, and Liechtenstein, who all manage to punch above their weight, the Maltese national team has never got anywhere on the international stage. Why? Because in those countries, the players are happy to ply their trade in higher-profile leagues overseas, picking up skills which then serve them well when it comes to major tournaments. The Maltese, by contrast, aren’t so keen to leave. After four days here, I can easily understand why.