“Gozo is this tiny island in the Mediterranean, just off Malta. Its amazing. Oh, you haven’t been…? You must go.”

I had heard my boss say these words about fifty times now. She and her husband had honeymooned in Gozo for two weeks and for as long as her tan lasted she told everyone within twenty metres of her how great a time they had had.

This was about twenty years ago and I was in one of my first jobs in the south of England. Twelve years later, I was moving abroad and Malta was one of the places I was interested in, and ultimately chose to make my home and life.

When you choose to move abroad there is a period that most people go through where they visit local sights and try to see as much as they can. Malta is so small that before long you have been almost everywhere and seen almost everything. Then, as time passes, it takes real effort to uncover the interesting and hard to find things that most visitors do not have the time for.

Those photos from twenty years ago of her honeymoon in Gozo are now a pretty close reflection of how I and many of my friends spend most weekends through summer. I’m at the stage now where a couple of my best friends live in Gozo and I have visited the island maybe fifty times. How things change…

IF YOU WANT TO HAVE AN AMAZING TIME IN MALTA AND GOZO, YOU CAN.

In early 2018 I was discussing new places to visit in Malta with an Italian friend and as the conversation moved, we realised that we ought to create an online resource to help identify and introduce the cool things that people should try when they come to Malta. Our twist, is that we would start the website in multiple languages from the very start. Not everyone reads in English you know…

Here’s the problem with Malta that you don’t know until you have already arrived: there are new tourists turning up every day of the year, which means that if a business or person gives you a raw deal or bad service, it’s no biggie to them, there will be lots of new people arriving tomorrow. In fact there is a word in Maltese for when something “just happens” and there is nothing you can do about it: mela.

We want to operate differently. We spend all of our time in Malta and know literally hundreds of people and businesses (Malta is very small). When we hear about, or use, people or businesses offering great experiences and treating their visitors really well, we will find a way to work with them or recommend them, so that our visitors (that’s you!) can benefit to help make your visit to Malta fun and special.

In a nutshell, that is the goal of MaltaStar.com:

WE WANT TO HELP MAKE YOUR VISIT TO MALTA FUN AND SPECIAL BY RECOMMENDING SOME REALLY COOL THINGS TO DO, WITH PEOPLE AND BUSINESSES THAT WILL TREAT YOU WELL.

The MaltaStar Team

The team behind MaltaStar.com is made up of several people. Firstly, Stuart, from the UK, who made St Julians his home back in 2011. He has worked as a consultant to Maltese businesses and also been employed within the igaming sector for several years, making him our insider into igaming. Secondly, Roberta from Italy, who first came to Malta as a student at an English language school. She has used her experience to help us select the best people and companies to work with in the English language sector. She studied in Malta for several months, then returned to Italy to put her new skills to work, before moving permanently to St Julians. Thirdly, Manwel, from Malta, who has lived on the island for his entire life. He brings a wealth of additional local information to the team, helping us to decipher and interpret life and the many things to do in Malta.

This site also has translations of much of the content into additional languages. This is for two reasons. Firstly, we realised that most content written about Malta is in English. The world is bigger than just English speakers and we hope to help as many people as we can. Secondly, since one of the bigger business sectors in Malta are the English language schools, we presumed that people who want to learn English might not yet be fluent in it. For this content we have friends who are fluent in the language either translate our English content or write their own words for us.

As a team, we often go out looking for new things to see and do, such as walks, bars, restaurants, shows, locations to visit and we hope to be able to pass on some of this insider insight to you.

We hope that you enjoy our website and that it helps you to find a fun activity to make your time in Malta the best that it can be.