NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 201560

MALTA

MAXIMA TOURSNew to TAP this year, Maxima Tours started going to Malta in 2013, but company founder

Gemma Allan is from Malta, and her son and Maxima’s experience director, Damon Allan, is a citizen of the small island country, “so it’s not like we’re rookies,” he said.

Maxima spent more than two years putting together the itinerary, often calling on — and sometimes incorporating — relatives, such as Damon Allan’s great aunt, a nun who greets the group during a village feast to celebrate a patron saint.

Malta is an island in the Mediterranean 50 miles south of Sicily, but it isn’t Italy. It is an independent country with two official languages: Maltese and English. Over the centuries, the Greeks, Romans, Muslims, Normans, Spanish, French and British have occupied the island, creating a rich and intricate history that awes visitors.

“We’ve got 7,000 years of civilization, so it’s a big wow factor,” Damon Allan said. “We have, arguably, some of the oldest temples in the world. We have temples that are 1,000 years older than the pyramids.”

Maxima limits the group to 17 to allow access to small sites. The trip includes a boat tour of Grand Harbor on traditional Maltese fishing vessels and a demonstration by a Phoenician-style carpet weaver. Travelers visit a man known as “the godfather of olive oil in Malta” for an olive oil tour and tasting, and go to a master cheesemaker’s farm, where they learn about the craft and even milk some animals.

The group spends time in the walled capital city of Valletta, which the Knights of St. John founded in the 1500s. In the silent city of Mdina — silent because the number of vehicles is limited — Maxima arranges for a drummer and two torchbearers to greet travelers at the city gates and lead them through the winding streets to cocktails and dinner.

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61WWW.TAPINTOTRAVEL.COM GROUPGROUPTRAVEL LEADER

THE

COMPANY :

M A X IM A TO UR S

E XPER T ISE :

ME D I T E RR A NE A N

E XPERIENCE :

7 Y E A R S

“As Malta is our exclusive

product, I have to say Malta.

We began this program in 2013,

and it is very popular for 2016

and will continue to be a high

demand product for years.”

TAPEXPERT

TR AVEL

2 0 1 6 H I G H L I G H T S

DAMON ALLAN

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