There always seems to be a catch. Whenever you find a great place there will always be a downside somewhere, even if it, or should I say they are a small downside.

We have come to love the area of St Julians in Malta and no doubt this will be where we move to next. As we have already made two moves in the last few months this will not be for a while but it is certainly our favourite place so far.

Until you actually live in a certain town or city you cannot really tell what it will be like but St Julians is ticking all of our check list. It has a lovely marina, a beach with sand (a rarity in Malta), great restaurants, a good supermarket (which seem to be few and far between), good bus routes and an M&S food store!

The only downside so far seems to be that in parts of the St Julians area the sea seems infested with Jellyfish. We have not come across these anywhere else in Malta so far but around the marina and hotel areas in St Julians there are tons of them. It could just be the time of year and they may just be around the shore area and not further out in the water but we are not willing to think of a plan to get past the ones at the shore just to find out if it is clear further out!

So the only downside to St Julians so far is that if you want to go for a swim you need to be eating fish and chips with plenty of vinegar and getting drunk whilst needing the loo…….Well if you get stung apparently what helps with the sting is vinegar (not sure a soggy chip will work), alcohol (okay maybe not a G&T) and well I am sure you can work out the last one!

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Thank goodness that the weather men often get the forecasts wrong!

After getting a few extra grey hairs (and sore knees from praying to the weather gods) worrying the weather would be bad for the royal parents visit, it turned out to be perfect. In fact one day my Mum actually commented on it being too hot, phew…

That was a really close call to say that just a few days ago we had rain (as my last post) and then the following day the heavens opened again in the afternoon. I must say though we actually liked it! I know that might sound mad after escaping the British and Canadian weather, but when it’s hot and sunny all the time rain is quite a novelty. When we got caught out in it last week we were in no rush to escape the rain drops that were cooling our scorched skin. Funny how your perspective of rain can soon change.

The main thing is our parents saw lovely sunshine for all of their stay and since then it has been getting hotter each day. The weather center today says it is topping 32 degrees, which I can believe. We best get used to it as within the next few months the temperature rises to 40 in the shade!

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Each time we chat to friends and family from back home we cannot help but slip into the conversation that the weather here is beautiful.

We wake up to blue skies and bright sunshine everyday, it’s wonderful. So if I tell you that next week sees our first family visitors from the UK. I bet you can guess what it did today…yep you got it, it rained and not just a shower either put proper real rain!

Now I got on my knees and prayed to the weather gods that please please don’t let this be a change in the weather my parents are due in day’s and even though I honestly have no magical powers, it will without a doubt be my fault if it is raining when they come to visit. What makes it worse is all my parents are telling me is how the weather in the UK is great at the moment!! This obviously makes the situation 10 zillion times worse.

You may think I am over exaggerating, but you don’t know my parents, especially my sun worshipping step dad! Even worse I have just checked the five day weather forecast and its all clouds, rain and thunder and lightning!!!! what did I do to deserve this?, the weather men can get it wrong though can’t they?………

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Okay so lets say you’ve moved to Malta and you discover a new area today in Valletta called the ‘Waterfront’ and out of a selection of great restaurants available you end up in the Hard Rock Cafe!!! How did this happen??

Well firstly we had not ‘found’ this area before as it is where the cruise ships dock and thus we try to avoid that area as it would be busy with tourists and prices in the shops and restaurants in this area are usually higher (as was the case). However they have really set up this area nice, it is literally next to where the cruise ships dock and the one in today was humongous. It was eight floors high and ran the whole length of the docking area.

We had a stroll along the front which was mainly occupied by restaurants, all of which looked really nice. Each one had its own seating area outside next to the water, overshadowed by the huge cruise ship.

As it was lunch time we decided to eat at one of these restaurants and did we choose which restaurant by the gastronomical delights on the menu? Of course not we chose the restaurant with the most comfortable squishy chairs underneath a big umbrella and then picked up the menus. Which brings us to how we ended up in a Hard Rock Cafe and not some typical Maltese establishment. I must say though that the nosh was great and we will definitely be back!

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