Thursday, July 19, 2007

Blue Grotto cliffs


Blue Grotto, known as Il-Hnejja (meaning 'The Arch') in Maltese, was given its English name by a British soldier who thought it similar enough to Grotta Azzurra (The Blue grotto) in Capri to deserve the same name. A trip to the Blue Grotto is high on the list of most people's itineraries, and with good reason. Located near Zurrieq in southwest Malta, an area famous for its rocky coastline, the natural sea caves are very appealing.

All the boats travelling to The Blue Grotto enter under an immense arch into a 140ft high cave cut into the rock face. The system consists of six caves carved by years of relentless pounding by the sea, of which the Blue Grotto is the largest and most impressive. The water seems an impossible cobalt colour as the sky reflects off the white sand bottom. The caves sparkle both with blue reflections of the sea and orange, purple and green of the various minerals present in the rocks.

7 comments:

marie6 said...

This photo was taken from inside the cave facing the opening and the sunlight.
If you dive in facing the sunlight and open your eyes underwater, you get to see the most amazing shade of blue of the sea. I tried it but was terrified at the same time as I kept expecting to see a wide toothy grin from a shark when I dived in. A lot of people say large fish is very common around these areas!!! But the water is so tempting that one cannot resist jumping in.

Mandy said...

o so beautiful

RUTH said...

That was the grottos I visited the ones at Capri..not Sicily :o)

Anonymous said...

This is an amazing set of photos and your description is faultless. I like your post these past few days.

Abraham Lincoln
Brookville Daily Photo

talj said...

Lovely photo and words :o) Also love what marie says about opening your eyes under the water, that must be fabulous! :o)

Peter said...

Phantastic place and phantastic photos - and text!!!

inspired said...

:o]