Dingli, the farming village on Malta's high western coast

Dingli is the village nearly everyone passes through on the way to its cliffs. That’s fair enough, because the coast is the best thing about it. But it’s worth a minute to understand where you are, a country village of 3,975 people that spent centuries looking out to sea without living off it.

Farmers above the sea

Ħad-Dingli’s local council tells it rather nicely. The village is by the sea and full of fields, yet sits so high above the water that its people never earned their living by fishing, only by working the land. The cliffs, which the Spanish Foreign Ministry’s country profile puts at up to 230 metres above the sea, had their uses too. According to the council, corsairs found them very hard to climb, villagers had time to take refuge, and the pirates themselves warned one another to steer clear of this coast.

The village’s history is bound up with Rabat and Mdina. The council recalls that for centuries Dingli came under the civil administration of both towns, sharing the same representatives and even the same doctor. Nearby stood Ħal Tartarni, a hamlet with its own parish from shortly before 1436, which emptied as its people moved to Ħad-Dingli and the lands of the Inguanez family. Dingli became a parish in its own right, dedicated to the Assumption, in 1678.

There are traces from much earlier. The council mentions tombs hewn into the rock by Phoenicians and Carthaginians and later reused by the Romans, and Roman baths at Għajn Handful and Ta’ Baldu. As for the name, it says it probably comes from the surname of Maltese families who owned land in the area.

What to see in Dingli

The main draw is the Dingli Cliffs, with the little St Mary Magdalene Chapel up top, praised by Malta Public Transport for its views. For me it’s the best sunset on the main island, and I go into it properly on its own page.

Right beside the village is Buskett Gardens, which BirdLife Malta describes as the one semi-natural wood in the country, planted by the Knights below Verdala Palace. Malta Public Transport recommends it for walks and picnics, and it works well before the cliffs.

The village itself is quiet. The NSO counts 156 foreign residents out of 3,975, a very low share compared with the coast, and you can tell it’s a place for local life rather than tourism.

A walk round the village

Before or after the cliffs, give the village itself half an hour. VisitMalta’s listing describes Ħad-Dingli as a quiet rural place whose parish church of St Mary, first built in 1678, dominates the skyline, with narrow, winding streets around it that are typical of an old farming village. It’s the kind of centre you see best on foot, with no plan, looking at doorways and balconies.

The same listing dates the little cliff-top chapel of St Mary Magdalene to 1646, so it’s older than the parish itself. It also notes that within Dingli’s limits there are cart ruts, those unexplained parallel tracks cut into the rock, and several megalithic structures. Below the cliffs, where the ground slopes before dropping again, farmers have worked tiny terraced fields for centuries, according to VisitMalta’s page on the cliffs. For me that’s the whole story of Dingli in one view, a farming village that clung to every scrap of land right to the edge of the sea. From the top you can also see across to the uninhabited islet of Filfla.

Local sons

The local council is rightly proud of the people Dingli has produced. It names the folklore pioneer Dun Xand Cortis and the playwright Francis Ebejer, the Dominican friar Walter Ebejer, who became a bishop in Brazil, and the notary Ġużè Abela, a finance minister respected for his integrity. Not bad for a village that, according to the same council, had no more than three hundred people when the Knights arrived.

It also points out how much has changed. A century ago it was hard to send children to school, as the boys worked in the fields and the girls helped at home from an early age. The council says the population has grown fifteenfold over the centuries, and the village now looks ahead with a confidence it didn’t have before.

How do you get to Dingli?

From Valletta bus terminus, on routes 52 or 56, both of which pass through Rabat first. From the airport, according to its own website, route 201 serves Dingli and Rabat. With a car, this is the sort of area where hiring pays off, since the cliffs, Buskett and Mdina link up easily; I cover the practicalities in driving in Malta. You’ll be on the left, as at home.

Where to stay

Not here. The MTA register lists no licensed hotel or guesthouse in Dingli, just six holiday lets. The obvious base is Rabat, with a five-star hotel, a small hotel and seventeen guesthouses, from where the same 52 and 56 buses reach Dingli in no time. If you’d rather be by the sea, Valletta or Sliema work too, with a longer journey. Either way, I’d time the trip so that you’re on the cliffs for the last hour of daylight and catch a bus back afterwards.