Have you ever heard of Malta? It is an island country in the Mediterranean Sea, between Italy and Libya, and despite its small size, it is a very densely populated country, filled with interesting history… including postal history! The Little Mail Carriers begged us to go visit, and so we sent them on to meet Lara Bugeja, the museum’s curator. Here is their report!
Ħello everyone! 👋 We arrived in Valletta, Malta’s capital on a beautifully sunny day and made our way to the Malta Postal Museum. We stopped outside for a photo and to admire the Baroque facade of this converted Valletta home. Lara mentioned everyone at the museum was delighted to see us as they had never had anybody so small visit!
Our first stop was in one of the galleries where an exhibition of landscape paintings was being set up. Did you know that the Postal Museum also functions as a Art Hub? We were lucky to see this nice exhibition coming together, from our perch on a wonderful sunset.
But we came here to see stamps and letters, so Lara gave us a whistle-stop tour of the museum. It was so much fun deciphering the script on the archive of letters, and admiring the wax seals! Most letters were in French, but some were in Italian, English and a few were in Maltese. The earliest form of postal service in the island dates from the early 1530s, when business letters were carried by small sailing vessels between Malta and Sicily.
We then hopped up onto one of their old postal counters and played for a bit, pretending to buy and sell stamps. The Museum has a fully functional post office, which in the past few years even had special postmarks for the World Postcard Day!
On a screen there was a video playing about mail distribution during the times of the Malta plague epidemic, so we got to learn about the deadliest event in Maltese history, which took place between December 1675 and August 1676. At the time, it was thought that paper could transport the disease, so mail was quarantined and disinfected. Although the video was interesting, we were horrified by the sheer number of rats that poured out of the screen… quite scary for us, being so small!
For something lighter, we decided to climb to the top of one of the museum’s motorcycles! The James ‘Captain’ 200cc motorcycle was used in the 1960s by postmen delivering to the more rural and inaccessible areas of Malta and Gozo. We managed to get up there safely, but it took us a while… Then, since we were already at it, we did the same with the bicycle near the entrance – and once we made it to the top, we had a good rest and brought out a picnic lunch!
After all these activities, we were quite exhausted, so we left to have a very well-deserved rest. Everyone in the museum was super nice, and we were delighted to meet them!
Thank you Lara, for taking care of the little ones and showing them the Malta Postal Museum! Into their padded envelope they go, and who knows where they will land next… 😉
39 comments so far
Thanks for this interesting read. I've been to Malta once...about 30 years ago. I remember the post office counter as I changed money during a day trip to Valletta. Beautiful city with monumental buildings.
Love this blog. A place to visit it I ever get to Malta.
Thanks for sharing.
I really enjoy this blog. I have a simple question, how can I host the little mail carriers for few days in Cyprus?
Love seeing their travels! I think you should put them into a book!
Can’t wait for their next adventure …I love the post and information.
This blog reminds me of the school project of Flat Stanley we did in elementary school where we colored in Stanley and put him in an envelope to send to a parent-selected friend or relative and they would take him on adventures and send back the photos (we couldn't email photos back then, kids!), then we could present about it in class. It was such a fun project and I'm delighted to see it recreated like this. :)
This is great! I'm heading to Malta on holiday in a few weeks. Hopefully I'll visit the postal museum now that I know there is one 😁
How fun! My family came to the US from Gozo in the 1940s. I am always interested in reading about Malta.
Thanks for taking us along on the tour! I would like to visit there.
The little mail carriers had such a nice visit to the Malta Postal Museum! Thank you for telling us about it. 📬
Just great!!! Thank you, I will start visiting the site more often...
This is a wonderful article. The little mail carriers have such fun on their adventures. I can't wait to see where they go next.
Little postmen delight with their travels and stories about them. ☺️🙌💖💌
I enjoyed reading this report. It's interesTing tot learn about the postoffice/ museum. The common threat in this story, the cute little playmobil dolls are awesome. I enjoyed het museum as much as they did. I also would like to ride the motorbike. Thanks for sharing this information. Well done!
Another good reason to add Malta to my travels this coming year!
I visited this museum the first year it opened. It is fabulous. Will definitely go again when I can get back to Malta. Thanks for sharing and bringing back great memories
Love this blog! Can't wait to see where our little friends are headed next!
Thank again for the new adventures. Keep going.....
Extra reason to visit Malta. Also works a warm up to the visit next week to Postal service Museum in Brasília! Looking forward to the next adventure of those litlle lucky guys.
Really love the Little Mail Carriers. Hope there are many more stories to come.
Wow - how exciting! I am planning to go in June to visit Malta, and for sure I will visit this postal museum as well :D and I already discussed with some locals to have a oostcrossing meeting :D https://community.postcrossing.com/t/17-june-2023-meeting-in-valletta-malta/517392
I really enjoyed this story.
I visited the Malta Postal Museum! I liked my time on Malta & Gozo.
Another highlight was an excursion to the Playmobile Fabric. Therefore the Little Mail Carriers should return one day, but I doubt if photographing is allowed.
Book well in advance. No postcards available.
Thank you for sharing!
As usual, a very engaging story! Its interest makes me want to learn more, and that makes it a success. Can’t wait for the next installment.
will surely visit if i go to malta
What a super story! :-)
I wish, I'd seen that museum and post office, not to mention the shop, when I was in Malta, a looong time ago!
Thank you so much Little Mail Carriers for this amazing visit!
I spend every year my holidays at Malta - it-s the best place in the world!
And of course I've visited the Museum, it's great, especially I loved the view from the rooftop....
Keep on travelling!
An interesting story!
What fun! Thanks for sharing this adventure.
I wanna visit Malta one day, looks amazing
I wonder what the little people had for lunch in the museum. Did they manage to post a postcard?
How lovely to see that the Little Mail Carriers were just a stone's throw away! ♡
Thank you for sharing this beautiful story and place
Definitely a place to visit! Thanks for sharing your travels.
Thanks for taking us / taking me on this virtual visit to
Malta Postal Museum!
Beautiful story Beautiful place!
Kudos to Little Mail Carriers!
:) :D
My grandson lived and worked in Malta around one year and of course he send me some viecards from place which he visited. Unfortunatly all postcars were without stamp cancellation.
Nice story about Malta museum
I just love this series... so many interesting places and bits of new information!
If the little guys would find their way to me one day, they would join the local after school club which I run in a highschool in my town: the kids and I are doing Postcrossing together :) And we could make a tour around our town and share a lot of information about its old history and our area, which is an UNESCO world heritage region! :)
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