Lascaris War Rooms, the bunker that ran Malta's defence

Some war sites tell you the story; others put you inside it. Lascaris is the second kind. You go down 150 feet below the Upper Barrakka Gardens into the rooms where Malta’s air defence was run and where the Allied landings in Sicily were planned. It isn’t cheap, but there’s nothing else like it on the island.

What these rooms were

The Lascaris website doesn’t mince its words. The rooms are cut 150 feet beneath the Upper Barrakka Gardens and the Saluting Battery, and they were Britain’s war headquarters in Malta. The RAF’s fighter control room was here, coordinating the defence of an island Heritage Malta describes as one of the most heavily bombed regions in the world between 1940 and 1942.

The best-known chapter comes in July 1943. Eisenhower and his Supreme Commanders, Admiral Cunningham, Field Marshal Montgomery and Air Marshal Tedder, used the rooms as their advance Allied HQ for Operation Husky, the invasion of Sicily. I find it remarkable that this happened in rooms dug out beneath a public garden in Valletta. For the wider picture, read Malta and the Second World War.

It didn’t end in 1945, either. NATO used the rooms from 1967 for about ten years. Since 2009 they have been restored by the Fondazzjoni Wirt Artna, a volunteer-run foundation funded by ticket sales and supporters, which now opens them to the public. That puts the €20 in a different light for me, because what you pay goes towards keeping the rooms open.

Getting to the Lascaris War Rooms

The official address is Lascaris Ditch, Valletta, and there are three easy ways in. From Castille Place or Upper Barrakka, take the Battery Street steps down. From the bus terminus, the website recommends walking through the Ganado Gardens. And if you arrive on the Sliema ferry at the Marsamxetto landing, Malta Public Transport runs a free shuttle to Lascaris.

I’d come from above and combine it with the Saluting Battery in Valletta, which sits right on top. Arrive a quarter of an hour before 12:00, watch the gun, then head down to Lascaris.

Tickets, hours and the pass worth having

Adults aged 16 and over pay €20, seniors €19 and children aged 5 to 15 €7. The family ticket, two adults and three children, is €40, the same as two adults alone, so with children it’s a no-brainer. You can visit Monday to Saturday between 09:30 and 17:30, with the final admission at 17:00, and it’s shut on 24, 25 and 31 December, New Year’s Day, Good Friday and on Easter Sunday.

Two practical points. It’s card-only, as Wirt Artna runs cashless. And it isn’t part of Heritage Malta’s Multisite Pass. What does make sense is Wirt Artna’s own Heritage Pass, €50 per person or €95 per family, valid for a week with one entry to each of eight sites, among them these rooms, the battery overhead, the headquarters tunnels and the Malta at War Museum in Birgu. Do Lascaris and two of the others and it has paid for itself.

If the pass tempts you, the Malta at War Museum is the easiest of the others to add. It’s at Couvre Porte in Birgu, buses 2 and 3 from Valletta stop by the gate, and it costs €14 on its own, with underground air-raid shelters of its own. Same opening hours as Lascaris, same card-only rule, and the same volunteers behind it, so the two feel like two chapters of one and the same story.

Lascaris or Fort St Elmo?

That’s what I’d be asking if I only had time for one war site. Fort St Elmo costs €10, holds the George Cross and covers everything from the Bronze Age onwards. Lascaris costs twice as much and focuses on 1940 to 1943, but it puts you in the room where the decisions were made. If the Second World War is your main interest, I’d choose Lascaris. For a broad sweep of Malta’s military history, go for Fort St Elmo in Valletta. If you can, do both, on different days so you don’t overdose on war. Lascaris is closed on Sundays while Fort St Elmo opens daily, which makes Sunday the natural day for the fort.