TRAVEL: Gozo Cliffs, Walks & Film Sets

If you check out the Travel tag of this blog you'll see see that I go to Gozo and Malta quite a lot.  After being home a month I thought it was about time I share a few pictures from my latest trip.  In an attempt to give you a quick tour of these sunny islands that I love so much I'm going to split my holiday pictures over a few posts, a mini series of Gozo and Malta in 2014!

When we visit this little Mediterranean spot we always stay on the small island of Gozo, a lot more quiet, agricultural and relaxed than Malta.  Gozo doesn't have the package holiday resorts Malta is known for, and instead is known for it's mixture of cultures, bird watching and walks, the ecoGozo project aims for Gozo to become an eco-island by 2020.

We like to go for lots of morning walks when we're visiting, particularly along the cliffs at the south of the island.  Walking from Sannat to the beautiful Xlendi Bay, where its the perfect place to stop for a drink, the light white cliffs of Saguna and Sanap are a breathtaking contrast with the mediterranean sea below.

Right now Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are in Gozo filming 'By The Sea', a film which is set to be a romantic drama written and directed by Angelina Jolie.  It's pretty exciting times for the island, it's especially exciting when I'm hearing that friends and family have caught a glimpse, or even spoken to the stars themselves!!

We walked along the Ta' Cenc cliffs ending up at Il-Kantra lido.  Along the route you get the most amazing views with the citadel at Victoria and dome at Xewkija one side and the sea on the other.  Once at the beautifully sheltered natural lido it's just a short drop down the hill to the bay of Mgarr-Ix-Xini, it's here where Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are filming, you can see in the pictures two of the sets mid construction for the filming that's starting around now - one rather large 'hotel' on the cliff, and a bar / tavern in the bay.

Mgarr-Ix-Xini bay is now closed to the public for the duration of the production, but luckily it was still open for the first week of my stay on Gozo.  It's one of my favourite places to swim on the island, the beautiful curved inlet is sheltered with a small but neat little beach.  I can 100% see why the Jolie-Pitts chose it for their location, and to say I'm excited to see the film is a massive understatement!