The Bazes

[Voy]

Have Voyaged - here's hoping it's Bon all the way ! And that we get updates !

[Baz Faz]

Hello there.
We had an incredibly smooth journey yesterday and everyone was helpful to us.
We had to have a taxi to Heathrow from Chipping Sodbury (expensive) because the lenghthy check-in meant there was no viable means of public transport. Of course we could have stayed in an airport hotel (never cheap) but we would still have had to get to Heahrow the day before.
Anyway, our taxi arrived early, our bags were loaded and then before we set off the driver made us check we had our passports and tickets. At Heathrow British Airways has its own terminal. The only other time we have recently travelled BA was 2 years ago when we did Toulouse-Heathrow-Bangkok so we had been in transit. This time check-in at Heathrow seemed unclear to brains addled by 2 days of online form filling (16 forms for our holiday or have I moaned about that already?). But BA staff were helpful to us two oldies. We had plenty of time for a coffee, then it was on the plane. BA only had one person checking boarding passes and documents so the flight was late leaving.
For complicated reasons we are flying economy out and biz class back to the UK. BA doesn't serve meals in economy in Europe any more but gives you a bottle of water and a packet of crisps (= chips for USAnians). You can pre-order sandwiches but no glutenfree for Mrs Faz so we brought our own. The flight is just over 3 hours.
At Valletta our entry was smooth and outside the terminal was the taxi we had ordered.
The driver Lucien was very good. We wanted to buy food for our first breakfast and he took us to a supermarket where we stocked up with lots of stuff. Then on to our apartment. Lucien knows the owner and had the key. He helped us in with our bags and the mass of shopping and we were in our temporary home.
The apartment is by the water with views across the bay. It seems new and is very clean and well equipped. We do have annoyances though. The owner is not here to explain anything and there is no welcome manual. How do we get online we messaged him? He replied the password is under the white box labelled GO. Well, would you have known? How do we work the cooker? He replied the instruction manual was in the cupboard on the left. Mrs Faz (with me beside her for moral support) found out we couldn't work it at first because there was a child lock on. The real test will be this evening when I cook our first meal. The hell of cooking in other people's kitchen. We do now travel (if we are renting an apartment) with a sharp kitchen knife but you can only do this if you have a bag in thee hold.
For dinner last night we went to the restaurant just round the corner and up some steps. We couldn't eat outside on the terrace (it's winter) but a table by the window gave us a nice view over the bay. We shared a salmon salad as a staerter (it was a vast bowlful); Mrs Faz had a seafood main and I had rabbit with pasta; dessert was some local dish of chocolate in pastry deepfried plus ice cream. A bottle of wine from the neighbouring island of Gozo.
Our remaining moan is the heating. It is by reversible airconditioning. There are controls in our bedroom, the sitting room and the kitchen (open plan means the last two are connected). We can only get the kitchen one working. We'll get onto the owner about this too.
Mrs Faz is sitting on our balcony with a fine view. The access road runs along the water's edge and ends at our place so we are not troubled by traffic. The only noise is the builders working somewhere out of sight. Oh, and the cats. The woman in a house below feeds some feral cats. We have watched her put food in different bowls which she dots around. The cats appear from the bit of spare land. Six cats a-meowing.
That's all folks.

[OnlyMark]

The best anti-climax I know of is spending a lot of time and trouble researching and filling out all the paperwork needed, and then nobody spends much time looking at it. I know you have more to come but hope that is an anti-climax as well.
Keep us updated about your adventures. Well done in getting there at least.

[sophie]

Echoing Mark: well done in getting there!!

[Baz Faz]

Mrs Faz has spoken to the cat lady and she is not a British expat as I thought but Maltese. There are 7 cats her she feeds plus more at another site. Also some ducks.
Mysteriously we have made one of the other "heating" units (it doesn't produce much heat) work. I have no idea how I did this. It doesn't blow out heat continously but in short bursts. Was this because I pressed a button called Follow Me? No instruction manual has been provided. Mrs Faz looked it up online and apparently this means connection to a remote control. This seems a suspect piece of information.

We went for a walk after lunch along the main road which runs behind our building. Fortunately we can't hear it. A lot of buses run along it. We called in at the council office to ask if they had bus timetables but no we would have to look online. We passed a sign pointing to a historic farmhouse. We came to a pile of large stones guarded by a dog. A cheerful man told us this was the historic farmhouse. On we went round a little headland until we reached the outskirts of the next village (Malta is small). It is out of season now but this is where flocks of tourists come in summer. It looks horrible so we came back home.

While I rested my wretched foot Mrs Faz went out again and found a small shop to buy more food. She came across a nature reserve with a marshland for waterfowl so she is happy.

[Baz Faz]

First dinner cooked in the new kitchen. Usual problems. There is an induction top which I hate. This one had a new quirk which I hadn't come across: if you turned one induction plate off the whole top turned off. You only discovered this when you found what you had left cooking was in fact just having a cool rest. Then the aubergine bought to make a starter turned out to be half rotten. There is more but that is enough.

[Baz Faz]

View from our balcony.

And view of Mdina.

Attachments:

[auntieannie]

Very nice, enjoy, you two!

[Baz Faz]

All our travels so far have by by bus (or on foot). Tomorrow we are hiring the nice taxi driver who brought us from the airport so we can see more of the island. Poor man is desperately keen as Covid has meant his income has plummeted.

[Baz Faz]

This is a sad bit of info. Do you remember my wretched foot which has sporadically featured in my posts on Meeting Pot? Back in December (before Christmas) I finally got to see the Dermatology unit at Bristol hospital. A biopsy was done using a bit of my toe. Yesterday I got a telephone call from the doctor who had done this with the unwelcome news that the diagnosis was angiosarcoma. This is a very, very, very rare form of cancer that forms on the inner lining of blood vessels and can spread to other parts of the body. Not good. (Oh, and when I said it was vvv rare Mrs Faz found a suspect bit of info that 1 in a million people got it. So I am special. I think I'll be a star at the hospital)

Google research says it can be aggressive and fast moving. Or it can be slow moving. Since I have had it for at least 8 months we can assume it is slow moving with me. That is cheering. So what happens now we asked this doc? First I needed to speak to some other specialist who wasn't available until Monday. Then scans would have to be done and then decisions made. The NHS moves slowly.

Monday is the day we are flying to Catania for 8 days. We have decided to go ahead with this but curtail our travels then and return to the UK. So I'll speak to the specialist on Monday and instruct her to book without fail scans for the day after we fly home.

Foolhardy? Possibly. But since I have had it for 8 months (at least) already, I doubt another week will make a tremendous difference.

So I have cancelled our 3 weeks in a farmhouse on Gozo and we are doing our best to change the BA flight.

[Voy]

Oh Baz, this is sad news indeed. But - finally you have an answer, and can start making a plan to fight it, which has to be some kind of relief. Put it out of our mind, and enjoy your week in Catania !

[auntieannie]

I am very sad about this news, Baz. bon courage flying back home.

[sophie]

Not great news, but at least you have news and can act on it. Good that you will enjoy the rest of your trip before returning to deal with the NHS.

[Baz Faz]

Thanks for the good wishes. It is a shame this wasn't discovered 8 months ago

[auntieannie]

indeed, Baz. indeed.

[auntieannie]

I hope you can get your amended return journey sorted now.

[kuskiwi]

Echoing the above and safe journey home.

[OnlyMark]

Good luck.

[Baz Faz]

Travelling these days involves a lot of bureaucracy which is mostly a waste of time and money. So it was yesterday when we flew from Malta to Catania. We arrived early at Malta airport so we could have the Covid tests that the Maltese government said the Italian government insisted on. Then we had to twiddle our thumbs for hours and eat half a disgusting sandwich before our flight. The flight was up and down in 40 minutes with a view of Etna volcano disturbingly close. Then the farce.

We deplaned and followed arrows to a test centre. We waved the email results of the tests we had paid for at Valletta airport but nobody was interested. We filled in forms, had a nasal test again and were cleared to go. At least this time it was free. Where do we go now? Out. No customs, no passport check, none of the other forms we had filled in. We just took a taxi to our apartment.

Here Santo met us and explained everything, an overload of information but so different from our apartment in Malta where we never saw the owner and there was no information pack. We like this apartment which has a good oldfashioned feel but everything works. Mrs Faz is particularly pleased that there is a bath which she much prefers to a shower.

Santo the owner had told us of a street with a lot of restaurants. While Mrs Faz unpacked I went out on a reconnaissance. I found a dozen places but one seemed by far the best. For a start it was full of locals, always a good sign. We came along at just past 8 and were given a friendly greeting and showed our digital pass that we had been vaccinated. We chose a couple of fishy dishes (prawns wrapped in bacon in a creamy sauce for Mrs Faz and seared tuna for me) and a bottle of Nero d’Avola wine (Avola is in Sicily but the vines that come from here are found all over the world now). Alas, the particular wine I chose was sold out but the waiter pointed out another Nero d’Avola wine which was cheaper. Recommending a cheaper wine is unprecedented in my experience. At the end of the meal we were brought glasses of Limoncello on the house. We didn’t see anybody being given that. It was either Mrs Faz’s smile or my age that impressed.

Today has been a day of sightseeing and shopping and dealing with health matters on our return to England. Catania has some lovely buildings within walking distance. We particularly liked the view of the cathedral from the central square. We sat on a café terrace for more than an hour watching the pigeons and a boy showing off on a bicycle and the very few tourists. This is the main square of Catania and I was delighted the coffee was only 2 euros each. Then it was down to the fish market to choose tonight’s swordfish.

We had breakfast in the sun on our terrace. Alas by dinner time it will be too cool for that.

Here is Mrs Faz's photo of the cathedral from our cafe table. You need to click on it to see it properly.

[auntieannie]

oh, very nice!

[Baz Faz]

Last night we had dinner at a trattoria not far from our apartment recommended by Chipping Sodbury friends. We'll go back and choose from the a la carte menu but last night we had the fixed price menu: a large bowl of mussels, seafood risotto, swordfish cake with salad, lemon water ice. It cost 15 euros. Wine was 4 euros a litre carafe,

[shrjeff]

this just in from british airways:

From 11 February 2022, travel to the UK is test-free if you’re fully vaccinated

[Baz Faz]

Feb 6, 2022 12:12:34 GMT 2 shrjeff said:

this just in from british airways:

From 11 February 2022, travel to the UK is test-free if you’re fully vaccinated

We are flying back on 10 Feb. But we have already paid for a test.

[tzarine]

safe journey home, baz

[Baz Faz]

Our journey home has started. We have returned to Malta and are in Valletta for a couple of nights. BA only flies the LHR-Malta route twice a week in winter.