Honeymoon on a Budget??? My Week in Malta

My new hubby would never have forgiven me if I'd try to go for a budget break for our honeymoon... but I do have some tips for anyone who is considering going to Malta, so buckle up for the adventure, romance and sunshine of this beautiful Mediterranean island.


First of all, may I say this has been an amazing break for us. Malta is beautiful, and at this time of year, it's not unbearably hot. The locals say it isn't summer yet, but I had to take care not to burn.

We stayed in the coastal town of Sliema.

This was recommended as it is quieter than neighbouring capital Valetta and the bustling St Julian's, but still in easy reach of most places. There is a new, modern shopping centre, lots of seafront cafes, and a great place to go swimming in the sea.

We went on lots of trips... to Valetta. Here is the most beautiful cathedral - St John's.

We also drank in The Pub - where Oliver Reed died. To be honest, it was a bit depressing, but I put that down to it being empty, near afternoon closing and Enigma being played in the background.



We visited the beautiful fishing harbour of Marsaxlokk. There is a market here everyday, but there's a really big one on Sundays.




...we bought and ate some of those sweets!

We walked to the prehistoric caves at Ghar Dalam. Here, many animal bones have been found which show how nanism (species of animals evolving into giant or dwarf versions) occurred as a result of the land bridge between Malta, Sicily and Europe disappearing. OH was thrilled at the prospect of tiny elephants!

 

And we went on a bus tour, stopping at the ancient medieval cities of Mdina and Rabat to explore the catacombs and WWII shelters under St Pauls.

We passed through Mosta - where the rotunda of the church is the 3rd largest unsupported dome in the world.

A bomb fell through the roof in the war, while people were inside praying. It didn't go off, and the congregation thought it was a miracle. After the war, the German bomber returned to the town to apologise and the town forgave him.

From there we went on to visit Golden Bay on the North-West coast - one of the few sandy beaches in Gozo. OH had a go at bodyboarding there. The waves were immense!

 

For his birthday, OH achieved a life's ambition and swam with dolphins.

It's not something I really agree with, but it made him very happy.

We also went on a booked excursion to a medieval banquet. The food was edible, the wine drinkable, and the 'play' that was put on was just that... as a medieval re-enactor, OH was a bit disappointed by the lame sword choreography. The whole thing was a bit Disneyfied. But the thing as whole was excellent fun, and the performances really good.

At one point they asked for volunteers to be made into knights by the Grand Master. We didn't realise those 'volunteers' had already been picked, but OH put his hand up, and the MC said, "Sorry, Madam, we're only picking men." When she realised her mistake, she was mortified! So, he got to be knighted after all.. as they hurriedly found him something appropriate to wear.

Yep - the one in the middle not wearing a black cloak with a Maltese cross.

We also tried scuba diving - I got as far as the sea and saw the seabed and a fish underwater after our pool session, but found the gear too claustrophobic and could feel panic setting in, so I didn't do much. OH was off though, chasing scorpion fish and all sorts!  (Note - really, don't chase those...)

So, those who expect us not to see the sights, just because it was our honeymoon, sorry to disappoint. Why travel all that way if you're not going to make the most of what a new place has to offer?

So, if you're planning a trip to Malta yourself, here are my tips:

Get Advice

Malta is a popular destination, so speak to friends who have been there already and they will be bound to be able to recommend places to stay and go. We got advice from a former inhabitant about which town and which hotel we might like. As it happened, we were fairly young for the average clientele of our hotel, but the location was perfect, the room was great, the facilities excellent. And the food! As we went half-board, we were glad the food was top notch.

Read up too. Before we went, we got  several guides from the library and read up on the history to decide the sort of thing we wanted to do there. We also bought a Marco Polo guide to take with us, using vouchers we were given as gifts. This was really useful.

Don't Drive

Really, life is too precious!  We saw several near-accidents every day as the driving is a bit cut-throat. Parking is nigh on impossible in some of the small towns too. Just take the bus... they are all run by Arriva, are comfy, air-conditioned and regular and you can get pretty much most places by bus. A week's pass will cost you €12.60, and will get you everywhere.

Multi-Pass

Heritage Malta run a scheme whereby you can see several of the island's top museums for €20. The pass gets you into The Museum of Archeology, the Armoury and State Rooms in the Grand Master's Palace, Fort St Elmo's War Museum and the National Museum of Fine Arts   - all in Valetta. We have heard that some of the more expensive multi-site tickets may not be worth the extra, as some of the museums don't have much to them.

Bear the Weather in Mind

Boat trips won't run on windy days as the sea gets too choppy, so if you do score a free harbour cruise from your bus tour at Sliema Ferries, try to take it as early as you can so you don't miss out. Or you can hang around the harbour and see if anyone passing has a ticket they can't use to spare...
Also, sun hats and sun cream are essential. We both used a children's factor 50 water resistant one from Nivea which cost £3.90 from ASDA. Don't be fooled into thinking you won't tan, or you need a special one for adults.

Grab the Opportunity

 Scuba diving is relatively cheap to try in Malta. For two of us, a taster session was just €60 from Aquarrigo. It just gets expensive if you want to qualify for a deep dive.

 It's free to...

• Take in the sights at Marsaxlokk and just wander around.
• Visit the Upper Barracca Gardens in Valetta, and they are beautiful too. Just don't be tempted to go down the lift there. There's nothing at the bottom, and they charge you a euro to get back up. Go just before noon, and you can watch the saluting battery be fired.
• Swim in the sea. Most of the lidos belong to the hotels, and in high season they may check you are a resident, but then again they may not. But those beautiful lidos are just sea water anyway. There are steps all around the bay in Sliema allowing access to the sea very easily.
• Go rockpooling. Guaranteed, you've never seen so many varieties of sea creature in the rock pools at home! A sort of mini scuba diving, if you like.
• Go for a run along the beautiful promenade between St Julien's and Sliema. This is very popular with joggers.
•  Use the play parks - there's some great play equipment for kids. But if you're a grown up, there are outdoor gyms by the seafront in Sliema, so you can play too!
• Go panning for salt, along some of Malta's famous salt pans.
• Go snorkling - we took our own equipment bought from Sports Direct dirt cheap.

Free Money

Yes, free money! When you arrive at the airport, you may be passed a form from the Malta tourism authority. If you fill it in and take it to their office in Valetta at the end of your holiday, they will give you a cheque for €20, which you need to cash there and then. Make sure you do so in the morning, as the banks close their desks in the afternoon.

And, I'm not suggesting you do this, but you could try scamming the scammers, like we did. An hour of our time, a sob story and an Oscar-winning performance on my part, and we got another €20 promised to us by a timeshare salesman, and they got nothing from us whatsoever! These people rely on the romance of Malta, your desire for escape and your lack of quick maths and observation skills. Really, you can offer me a holiday in Australia? But there's no photo of the accommodation...mmmmh
  
I love Malta - the sun, the history and culture and warmth of the place. I love the food and wine!
We are inspired now to be a bit like SFT and plan in some travel into our debt-reduction lifestyle. This year, a trip to Devon is in store around my birthday, Southend for a friend's birthday, and Brighton for a convention. Next year, we shall take a UK break in York, as well as stays in Glasgow and London for cons. and then in 2015 - either Sicily or Corsica - oh yes!

My Steampunk (ish) Wedding

Wow, am I one lucky girl!

I'm grabbing ten minutes while my new hubby catches up with watching the Grand Prix from the weekend. I like it too, but I can't sit and watch much TV for long periods unless for a film; I get restless.

We've got so much to do now we're back from honeymoon, but my burdens have been greatly eased by the amazing generosity of my friends and family who have helped out so much. My cats have been well looked after while we were away, and the friend who came to feed them has even tidied the kitchen for us (lesson here is, getting married, getting ready for a honeymoon and finishing editorial work are all things that require a Time Lord's intervention to be done at the same time, never mind being tidy about it). I am truly grateful!

I'm also nibbling away at one of my wedding pressies - a few delightful and very yummy moustache biscuits from a box made by  Emma B's Cakery.

I have talented and wonderful friends in abundance... I wasn't going to have a hen do this year, but my matron of honour, Kim Lakin-Smith, got together with a few friends and organised a wonderful trip round 78 Derngate for me on the day before my wedding. 78 Derngate is a wonderfully preserved arts and crafts house, designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. George Bernard Shaw stayed there once, in a very busy room. The hostess apologised for the jarring patterns, saying she feared he wouldn't sleep, to which Mr Shaw told her he always slept with his eyes closed. What a card!

Then, we had a mad hatters tea party in the cafe, with an abundance of Pimms, champagne, tea and chai, cakes and sandwiches. It was an elegant affair.

Photo by Sam Skevington

It was even attended by Queen Victoria in  mouse form...

Photo Sam Skevington

On the day of the wedding, Kim and my friend Sam came over to help me get ready. They did an excellent job and I scrubbed up quite decently. But more than that, they kept me going all morning with their support.

Also in the morning, my flower lady, Anne of The Flower Stylist came over to deliver my flowers. I can heartily recommend her work. She's kind, warm and creative, and her prices are very reasonable too! Here is what she did for me:

And here are the posies for my little bridesmaids.

My brother, James, drove me to the wedding venue with the girls, but we were told to go away as we were ridiculously early. To the car then, to groove to New Order for a bit.

Finally, it was time for the ceremony. Inside the guests were all grooving away to The Eagles' "Journey of the Sorceror" (Theme to Hitchikers' Guide to the Galaxy), and I got ready to go in with my dad.

My entrance music was the beautiful  "O Mio Babbino Caro" by Puccini, as sung by Katherine Jenkins. Yep - a Doctor Who connection.Why not? I love the song.

I don't think I stopped shaking all through the ceremony. It was all so lovely! Kim read from Peter Pan, chapter 3, which I chose because the characters are just children at heart; flawed, argumentative, but ultimately saved by each others' love. Sam read the Tattoo poem by Neil Gaiman.

I will write in words of fire. 

I will write them on your skin. 

I will write about desire. 

Write beginnings, write of sin. 

You're the book I love the best, 

your skin only holds my truth, 

you will be a palimpsest 

lines of age rewriting youth. 

You will not burn upon the pyre. 

Or be buried on the shelf. 

You're my letter to desire: 

And you'll never read yourself. 

I will trace each word and comma 

As the final dusk descends, 

You're my tale of dreams and drama, 

Let us find out how it ends.

We signed the register while Murray Gold's "The Wedding of River Song" played.

Photo Annie Ko

 And then we were man and wife! Exit to Peatbog Faeries, "Folk Police".

And I'm sure you will agree, our wedding was a stylish and bohemian thing...

Photos Ian Whates

People did say they thought we looked fantastic. Well, they did, until they saw the cake. And then it was all about the cake.

Photo Joe Brown, cake by the amazing Claire Tong!

Isn't that an amazing cake?!! Claire Tong is one talented woman. She makes very delicious cakes with fine sugarwork. she makes lots of craft items too, and acts in plays to boot!

Yes - she's thinking of doing this professionally. Good, hey? I can put in a word, if you like ;P (EDIT: Sadly, Claire is not thinking of going pro after all...)

The hat decoration on the cake matches the buttonholes and other featherwork worn by OH and our retinue as made by our friend, Tamsyn Payne, who is a costume designer (as well as about a hundred other creative things, all of which she is brilliant at).

My OH looked very dapper, but thought he'd swap clothes with our friend Andrew Reid for our first dance to Muse.

We also had entertainment from magician Al Rudge. My little nephew really enjoyed his nail trick! I can't seem to find any pics at the moment, so if anyone has any, please let me know. In fact, I've been cheeky and grabbed a few from my friends on Facebook, but I'm hoping you'll let me keep copies for my personal albums.

And music came from the amazing Jordan Reyne, who was so good, she made my dad cry!

Photo Ian Whates

Finally, we discoed the night away to the tunes of Kill Whitey DJs Dan and Lauren, who made an excellent start with "Doctoring the Tardis" (KLF) followed by "Can You Dig IT?" (PWEI) and carried on from there.

I am knackered just writing this lot up. Think you'll have to wait a bit for the honeymoon follow-up. Dodgy photos a-go-go!

Yippee Kayay - Dye: Hard!!!

I went to the Arthur C Clarke Awards ceremony at The Royal Society last night and had an excellent time. I was thrilled to see Chris Beckett win for his novel Dark Eden. It's fantastic book, told from the point of view of several young characters who are descended from just two survivors who crashed on an alien planet generations before. It's brilliant storytelling, and I highly recommend it.

Here is Chris, giving a speech just after the award was announced.

I dressed quite glam for the occasion (for me) in a sparkly dress I got from a swishing party. That's a party where you take along clothes or accessories that are decent but no longer your thing, and swap them for something that is. I'm afraid I don't have pics... mind, I'm kind of ashamed of my hair! I have dyed it Raspberry Rebel ahead of my wedding, but my hair is rubbish at taking dye, and 2 boxes have left a lot of hair still brown. So another 2 boxes have been acquired... all in all my hair will have cost £15 to colour.

If you're wondering why I don't just go to the hairdressers, I must admit that they slightly scare me,  and not just because I have to put my hand in my pocket. I don't know why it is, but I turn into  a mouse and can't say what I want to them. I've only been a few times, and most visits have just been awful. In the past, hairdressers have insisted on giving me perms I didn't ask for, fringes I didn't ask for, stupid one inch layers, left perming solution on my hair so long that it burned my hair and all broke off, and several times, after I've gone in with my several years' growth of untouched hair, they've gone a bit scissor-crazy and just cut off far too much. I've also been massively underquoted as professionals have encountered my dye-resistant hair and had to charge me for additional boxes and time.

So, pics only when it looks decent.

Here's something that has worked: a friend has treated me to some false nails and helped me apply them:

Girly hands!

I must admit, things  are a bit trickier to do with nails like this, but they do look fab.

Good Things Come to Those Who Wait for Good Things to End Up in the Charity Shops

Sometimes it's worth counting your blessings.

In what seems like a bit of a bad news story, OH and I find ourselves to be a very lucky couple indeed. Our wedding venue has been sold to a local college and anyone who had planned an event there after 30th June has been told they need to find somewhere else. That's 50 disappointed couples. some of them only have a few weeks to find somewhere else.

I feel blessed to live in a town that has so many great amenities. I know a lot of people moan about the number of charity shops and pound shops in the town, but they have been an absolute lifeline for me as I try to source everything from stationery to decorations to items for my jewelled wedding bouquet.

And as OH's parents are unable to make the wedding, we are having the ceremony videoed. We had looked at getting a tripod for the camera, but they were too expensive, even secondhand. But yesterday, OH managed to find the exact right one in a Cancer Research shop for £5!!

I love this shop - it always has great quality clothes in it. Sorry, this is an old pic, the store has had a bit of a spruce and looks very inviting now.

And we have sourced some very cheap packs of photo frames from the 99P Store to decorate the tables with. As we are having characters to denote tables rather than numbers, this will be useful... although some of the fellas do look very similar.


J M Barrie



H G Wells

Arthur Conan Doyle

Can you imagine if that's your game of Guess Who?

"Do they have a moustache?"

"Yes."

"Is it H G Wells?"

"No. My go. Do they have a moustache?"

"No."

"Yay! Is it Lewis Carroll?"


"...I hate you, you know."

Some compromises are having to be made. We are having a friend who is a professional photographer do official photographs at mates' rates, but in addition to that we wanted to have fun cameras on the tables. I've suggested instead that we ask our friends for access to their photos via Facebook, which we could print out ourselves for our album.

But over to you - what brilliant charity shop/pound shop finds have you made recently?

Wedding Crafts: Look what I did!

Wedding craft progress so far:

Due to a couple of completely independant crises - all involving completely independant episodes of crafting - my Saturday night of girlie crafting turned into just me, a packet of custard creams, some rosé wine and a box set of Ashes to Ashes. Gotta love Gene Hunt!

Here, table planner in progress, stage 1. The place cards are all done and so is the box for cards. My place cards all feature an eminent Victorian or Edwardian and something associated with them and are stamped on the back with a wedding glasses stamp that we had bought for another project. I found a pack of A4 cards in Poundland for  - £1 (duh). Plenty to last for other crafting projects.

In fact Northampton's infamous variety of cheap shops have helped enormously.  Thanks to a tip off on Money Saving Expert I picked up a pack of CDs for a quid in Poundland for recording our ceremony music.

Here's the table planner a little further on (not quite finished). Some of the spaces have now been cut out for a red background to show through. Yet to be added are more devoré bits, trailing fronds and liana picked out in gold and (if I can find them) stick on bling.

Can you spot the various themes? Hardest I imagine will be the one for the top table, which is the actress Ellen Terry, who was a bit of a muse for Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw, as well as a friend to Lewis Carroll when she was a child, and later again after he deemed her respectable enough company (she ran away from the aging, stuffy husband that she was married to aged 16, the painter George Frederick Watts, and ran away to live in sin with Edward Godwin, who designed our town's beautiful Guildhall!). See theatre stage light scalloping, chains (representing her character Margaret in Faust) ending in pigtail-like tassles, cherubim, a Puck, and a couple of little frogs, of which she was quite fond.

 

Red gift wrap covers a free cardboard box to collect our cards. I hunted high and low for suitable paper and couldn't find any in the pound shops, so went to the reliable W H Smiths. For two large rolls, this cost £2.99, but I only used half of one roll. You can pay £5-8 for plain boxes that still need to be decorated, and some people pay a lot more, so this is a much more frugal effort.

 





 

 

A long time ago in a galaxy far away, I started making the favours. This is part one - A New Hope - or, strawberry white chocolate stormtroopers - just a few drops of strawberry essence in basic white chocolate. As you can see, the force is not strong with some of them. Due to time restrictions, and only having 6 stormtrooper moulds to work from, I also made use of old chocolate trays, which produced some unusually shaped chocolates. The truffle ganache ones will be made later this week as they will involve cream and will need to be kept refridgerated as long as possible. I sourced some cellophane wrap and ribbon which would have only cost about a fiver to package the lot, but OH thought he would help me out a few weeks ago and got proper boxes from Hobbycraft, which, as all crafters know, is more about the 'hobby' and less about the 'craft', and not so blooming cheap either. Still, he got to try one of the rejects and pronounced it "Mmmmmm delicious!", so that's all good.

 

 

But now we really have run out of money... everything else we still have to pay for is going to be on plastic. Austere times ahead...

 

And so phase one of frugaldom proper begins... to be continued.



The final countdown...

Reader, I am marrying him in 9 days' time!

...and money is running out (what's with the present participle there - it's gone!). Luckily, I have some wonderful friends who are helping me to achieve what will be a wonderful wedding day - undoubtedly!

I'm also using a bit of money savvy.

I'm going home tonight with a bag of orange and white packaging for making handmade chocolate favours this weekend and next week (got to make the ones with cream a bit closer to the day).

Sorry cocoa purists... but I'm adding a bit of froo froo to the basics so it should all be wonderful anyway.

For the table planner and name cards, I'm taking inspiration from a number of emminent Victorian and Edwardians, and keeping it elementary:

 

 

 

And for the card post box, I'm going a bit Blue Peter! Can you still buy crepe paper anywhere? I may have to settle for newspaper and a small pot of red gloss...

While my OH is out being a stag this weekend, I'm opening up my house to friends who wouldn't mind popping in for biscuits, tea, and cutting and sticking things. There's a lot to do and I really would appreciate a hand.

Alas, I've let the fitness slip a little as I've been so busy, so no parkrunning this week...but maybe next week for their first year party.

Do You Do a Date Night?

OH and I are going to be spending forever together as Mr and Mrs very soon, but like many couples nowadays we're already living together as life partners.

We decided a few months ago that we should do a 'date night' each week: time consciously chosen to be spent in each other's  company. It's amazing how you can spend hours alone with each other but just end up staring at the telly. It's not good for the bum, the brain, the soul - or the heart.

Some date nights of extreme frugaldom will need to be planned in for after the wedding, but we're already applying some mantras: never pay full price if you can help it; dare to try something different.

The Date

Through a friend at work, OH got a great offer for theatre tickets. Some theatres offer great discounts to some associations, or for special preview nights. We were thrilled to be able to go and see a preview of A Midsummer Night's Dream.

This was a great production, directed by Gary Sefton (we saw his also brilliant production of A Christmas Carol), with some great comic performances. As you might expect with 500 year old humour, there's also a bit of nuddiness and scatalogy, but it's all fine. ;-P

As an avid theatre-goer, I really wouldn't mind paying full price to see this brilliant production... it was just an extra lovely bonus to get excellent tickets for less than half the cheap seat prices. It's not an opportunity that's going to come along too often - I think our next bit of theatre may be a bit of am dram, but as an am drammer myself, I know these can often be excellent too! (shush).

The Dinner

Of course, we needed to eat too! But why pay full price when, with a little planning, you can get a great deal? There are a few good restaurants near the theatre, and some do pre-theatre early bird offers. I checked to see what vouchers were available online and got one for Pizza Express, Monday-Thursday, 5pm-7.30pm, 25% off main meals (excluding calzones).

Well, on hearing that calzones were excepted, this placed the idea in OH's head that this was what he really wanted to have. No calzones - denied! But he went for a classic Pollo ad Astra pizza instead  - chicken, sweet peppadew peppers, red onions, mozzarella, tomato, cajun spices and garlic oil. I went for the Gorgonzola and Pancetta Leggera - with chilli, rosemary and leeks on a crispy Roman base and a dressed rocket salad middle (under 500 calories - got to think of the dress!). We both agreed that the pizzas we had were utterly gorgeous. And did they taste better for being discounted? Do you know, I think they did.

The Post-Theatre Drinks

A beautiful night should not end too soon, and so we decamped to The Wig and Pen. The Wig and Pen is lush, but a little pricey. It's clean, bright, and comfortable, with a great range of real ales, ciders, spirits, wines, and jolly nice food. Again, though, why pay full price? Not when we have CAMRA* membership! That's 10% off and everything's bright and reasonable again. At the pub we bumped into a friend who'd been to a play rehearsal of his own... so that's one am dram play we have pencilled in for a future date night.

*It's well-worth joining CAMRA if you are a real ale or cider fan. It's not just beer in pubs and supermarkets that gets discounted, as there are lots of member offers.

Savings?

Amazingly, we managed to save just under £45 on our night out... it wasn't exactly a free night out, so has to be considered as a special treat, but it was still practically half-price.

What Would I Do Differently?

Despite what you may infer from the above, I would actually say that to save even more money it's worth resolving to drink less, or not drink at all. Alcohol takes the edge off your inhibitions, weakens the purse strings... and makes you lazily decide to get a taxi home instead of walking. Also, why always do the same thing? Do you really need a half-time ice cream?

So, next time...

1. Going am dram... as a member of the group I can buy  concessionary tickets, so even cheaper.
2. Taking bottled water/pop
3. Walking to the venue - and back!
4. Choose an awkward mid-run weeknight so not tempted to follow the cast back to the pub for post-gig drinks.
5. Either have a slow-cooker meal ready for after the show. Or have just one post-gig drink, maybe.