Malta - the Limestone Heritage

My second blog on Malta's limestone. See first part on the limestone and caves.

The Limestone Heritage is a very interesting place, basically an exhibition of how the stone was quarried. It is located in an old quarry just outside Siggiewi. Globigerina Limestone was quarried here but due to the number of fossils the rock was unsuitable for building so the quarry was only operational for 5 years.

9 Euro entry. Firstly you watch a short film in an auditorium, many languages are available. The film was really interesting, telling about the use of quarrying from early times to present. The film said that more stone has been produced in the last 40 years using modern mechanized techniques than was produced in the last 700 years. In the days of horse and carts, 30 blocks could be put on one cart. The men worked from sunrise until midday.

Then you go on a self guided tour with a headset. The exhibition is laid out in the old quarry and there are 14 stops with explanation at each one. You see the methods of stone extraction, originally done by hand using splitting techniques, then the more modern techniques using machinery and saws and you see how the stone was loaded onto the trucks - these replaced the older horse and carts.  It was really good although I found it a bit rushed. The models of the workers looked lifelike, wearing real clothes.

The quarry walls -

bell well

After you go around a few more exhibits showing the use of stone. You walk past a farmhouse with has many stone features, e.g. water channels, cupboard, stove, ventilator, staircase etc.

This example of  stone cat door is interesting -

There is an example of a girna, the traditional Maltese stone hut used by herdsmen for shelters and many can still be seen across Malta.

There is also an example of a limestone tomb.

Then you go into the garden where orange, lemon, olive and pomegranate trees are grown – citrus groves are commonly planted in disused quarries as they are a sun trap. The petting area has goats and 2 donkeys and there are birds such as peacocks.

Inside the building is a museum with a large display of masonry tools, for sawing and splitting the stone.

And of course there is a souvenir shop at the end of the tour!

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© Liz Price
No reproduction without permission

Limestone and caves on Malta

Malta is basically a lump of limestone in the Mediterranean sea! You see limestone everywhere. All the buildings are made from the cream coloured stone. All the dry stone walls in towns and countryside are made of sawn limestone blocks and or natural stones. They were all neat.

There are quarries everywhere, they are mostly rectangular deep holes cut out of the rock. Many buildings were built on the site where the stone was quarried, so some have a cellar.

The Malta limestone is young, the oldest only dating back to the Tertiary period. The surface outcrops are about 30 to 35 myo. The limestone can be divided into 5 layers. At the top is the Upper Coralline limestone which is hard, this is followed by a thin band of Greensand, then a softer rock called Blue Clay. Globigerina Limestone is the next layer and is soft-hard. The hardest rock is the lowest, the Lower Coralline Limestone.

The softer Globigerina Limestone has been used for the majority of Malta's building material over the years. The harder more coralline stone was used for the important buildings.

In some places there are large limestone pavements. One such area is at Buskett, near Dingli on the south coast. The Dingli cliffs are a tourist attraction.

The limestone pavement has tourist attractions, Cart Ruts, aka Clapham Junction, and Ghar il-Kbir.

The cart ruts are grooves up to 60 cm deep with an average distance between them of 110 to 140 cm. The age and purpose of these ruts is a mystery, one suggestion is they were made by the carts pulling out stone blocks. Malta has an ancient history, the megalithic temples are regarded as the oldest free-standing buildings in the world, even older than the Pyramids and Stonehenge. In this limestone pavement are 2 cave entrances in the ground, both 'protected' by stone walls. I assume this is Ghar il-Kbir. The information board says Ghar il-Kbir is a complex of inter-connected caves that were used as habitations. They were described in 1637.

I saw quite a few snails here.

Further east from Dingli is The Blue Grotto and Wied Iz-Zurrieq Merhba.

A wied is a dry valley and they can be seen all over the island.

In summer months there are boat trips to the Blue Grotto, but during the winter the sea is wild and the wind can be incredibly strong - as it was during my visit. So I was only able to look down on Blue Grotto from the view point at the top of the cliffs.

The cliffs opposite Blue Grotto -

Small limestone island off the coast

I also went down to sea level to see the sea pounding the rocks.

 The limestone hill -

Ghar Dalam is probably the most famous cave on the island. It is an important fossil site and is a tourist attraction.

Entry is 5 Euro. Firstly you can go round the museum which is really interesting and in the second room is a huge collection of bones.

Then you walk down to the cave.

The cave is only 144 m long. There is a pathway through the first section and electric lights. Short but interesting cave.

The Limestone Heritage is a very interesting place, see next blog.

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UPDATE 2020 :

An interesting article on Ghar Dalam on Ancient Origins 8 March 2020.

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© Liz Price
No reproduction without permission

Hungary Aggtelek area

Having driven across Hungary, (Fertorakos limestone quarry and Tihany and Lillafured ) we finally arrived at Aggtelek for the cave rescue conference. This was Sept-Oct 1983.

Whilst there we visited Baradla. From my diary -
Absolutely excellent cave. Start by following various static(?) pools and a railway line, saw an eel and loads of old stal. This brought us into the huge orchestra chamber. We turned right past the boats and walked a long way through the huge passage and still river. We went to the end of the show bit and then back and up past the orchestra into various chambers with huge Berger style stals. Amazing. On round and through and after 1 1/4 hr came out at the entrance Aggletek (?) at the  back of the campsite. Then walked up over the karst to the cliff top above the cave and back to the hotel.
Excellent. This is Hungary's longest cave at 25 km, although 7 km are in Czechoslovakia (Domica), and beats all English show caves.

Later in the week we did a through trip from Baradla to Josvafo, including Retek - Radish and covered 7 km.

We visited the thermal baths at  Miskolc Tapolca, south of Miskolc. My first visit to a thermal spring and it was really enjoyable. 3 coaches left Aggletek and on arrival we had to wait a few minutes until 6pm, as apparently one is only allowed 1.5 hours in the water as it is healthily radioactive! All changed in big cubicles in one room then went to the water. This was a semilit cave passage, water fairly warm but a lovely surrounding. Air really humid. There was a waterfall in one place with 5 or 6 spouts. I've never seen anything like it. We had found a warm pool and a hot pool, the latter was lovely, almost like a bath. Water just under waist depth. Very enjoyable. We then had dinner in the adjoining restaurant with traditional gypsy violinists. Entrance to the baths -

Our route across Hungary to Aggtelek -