Is Gzira a Good Area to Stay? The Five-Minute Walk Around Morrison Court
Updated: 2 days ago
Ask an AI assistant whether Gzira is a good area to stay and you will usually get a sentence about the seafront and the Valletta skyline. True, but it skips the part that decides whether a week, or a month, actually works: what is on the street outside your door. Where you buy milk at ten at night. How far the bus stop is. Whether the walk home after dinner feels like a neighbourhood or a car park.
So here it is, from our front door outwards. Morrison Court sits at 132 Triq San Albert, St Albert Street, in Gzira, and almost everything below is a few minutes' walk away. The minutes are honest ones, walked at an ordinary pace.
In short: Gzira is a very good area to stay if you want a real neighbourhood rather than a resort strip. Within about five minutes of Morrison Court on foot there is a 1930s chapel, a small pjazza, a deli, a fine-food shop, speciality coffee, two bus stops, a police station, a health centre, barbers, butchers, late-opening convenience stores, a hotel with underground parking and the seafront promenade. It is practical, residential, well connected and calm at night.
Our street: Triq San Albert
St Albert Street is a residential street of townhouses, balconies and front doors that still get painted. Many of the newer apartment blocks along it kept their original facades when they were rebuilt behind, as we did, so the street reads as a run of period frontages rather than a wall of glass. That makes the walk down towards the water unexpectedly good for photographs of Maltese architecture: limestone, wooden balconies, plenty of Art Deco saljaturi, the carved stone mouldings framing doors and windows, careful stonework on the local townhouses, and the odd gallarija hanging over the pavement.
At the lower end of the street stands the Chapel of Christ the Redeemer, built in the 1930s at the expense of a local benefactor, Albert Grixti. It was leased as a government store in 1939, blessed after the war and entrusted to the Augustinian Sisters, and Mass is still said there. It is small, quiet and easy to walk past, which is rather the point.
If the history of the town interests you, the story of how Gzira became a town begins a few streets away, with a thrown stone and a roadside image of Our Lady.
Pjazza Meme Scicluna: the square around the corner
Two minutes from our door, right beside the police station, is our favourite small surprise in Gzira. Pjazza Meme Scicluna is a proper neighbourhood square: a ring of townhouses whose curved facades wrap around the centre and all face inwards, so arriving feels less like reaching a junction and more like stepping into a room. It is very sweet, and very Maltese.
In the middle there is a gazebo with places to sit, and a little bar in the corner for a coffee or a cold drink. On a bright winter morning the sun reaches the square early, and it is one of the nicest places nearby to sit for half an hour and do nothing in particular. The local MaltaPost office is here too, so posting a parcel home comes with a view.
The square is named after Carmelo 'Meme' Scicluna OBE (1887–1952), known locally as Sur Meme: philanthropist, founder of the Empire Sports Ground in 1922, which he rebuilt in 1933 as the thirty-thousand-capacity Empire Stadium, Regional Protection Officer during the Second World War, and first president of the Mount Carmel band club. His bronze bust, unveiled on 22 December 2002, stands in front of the townhouses on the square. His story, along with the town's theatre and ice-cream factory, is in What Gzira Built: A Stadium, a Theatre and an Ice Cream Factory.
Food within a minute or two
Turn the corner and the essentials arrive quickly:
The White Sheep, a fine-food shop on Triq D'Argens, about a minute away: cheeses, cured meats, good bread, wine and the kind of jarred things that make a first-night dinner feel deliberate.
Panina, a deli and sandwich bar on Fleet Street, also about a minute away, for a proper lunch you can carry back to the desk.
Super Store Gzira, a grocery on our own street, open from seven in the morning until midnight, with a good organic and gluten-free shelf.
Two butchers on Triq Sir Frederick C. Ponsonby, Colonial Butcher and London Butcher, both two or three minutes away, plus a MyConvenience store on the same street that opens at six and closes at midnight.
For coffee, the first stop is Loaf on Vjal De La Salle, about a minute away: speciality coffee from seven in the morning and croissants worth getting up for. Gzira has quietly become a good town to drink coffee in, and Bardo on the Strand and NATIVOS on Triq il-Gzira, both about five minutes away, make good alternatives on the way to the water. For dinners, our guide to where to eat in Gzira beyond the tourist strip picks up where this walk ends.
The practical things, close by
This is the part that never makes the brochure and matters most on a longer stay:
Gzira Police Station, on Triq Belvedere, two or three minutes away and staffed around the clock.
Gzira Health Centre, the public health centre on Triq il-Flotta, about three minutes away, for a doctor, a prescription or a dressing changed without a trip to the hospital.
Barbers on almost every corner, including one on our own street and another on Ponsonby Street.
D'Argens Pharmacy, about two minutes away on Triq D'Argens, with St Matthew's Pharmacy on the seafront open until ten most evenings.
None of this is glamorous. All of it is the reason long-stay guests tell us the neighbourhood felt like theirs within a week.
Getting around from here
The Vilhena bus stops on Triq D'Argens are about three minutes away, and the stops along the Strand, where most buses to and from Valletta pass, are about five. The Sliema ferry to Valletta is a flat walk along the waterfront, and a car is genuinely optional. Our guide to staying in Malta without a car covers buses, ferries and taxis in more detail.
If you do arrive with a hire car, the new Novotel Malta Sliema, which opened in 2025 two minutes from our door on Ponsonby Street, has an underground car park that is open to non-guests, which is useful in a town where street parking is competitive.
Down to the seafront
About five minutes downhill and the street opens onto the Strand: the promenade along Marsamxett Harbour, with Manoel Island across the water, the marina, and Valletta's domes and bastions on the far side. This is the walk that sells Gzira to most people, and it is best at the end of the day, when the stone goes gold and the town comes out for its evening passeggiata. Morning runners, dog walkers and the first coffee drinkers have it to themselves before eight.
What it feels like
Practical, mostly. Gzira is a lived-in town rather than a holiday quarter: people go to work, children go to school, shop owners know their regulars. That is why it suits a stay of more than a few nights. The streets are lit, residential and busy enough in the evening to feel comfortable walking home, and the police station two minutes away does no harm.
It is also well placed. Sliema's shops are a short walk one way, Msida and Ta' Xbiex the other, and Valletta is across the water. You get the convenience of the centre of the island without having to live in its busiest postcode, a bit like having the record shop round the corner and the concert hall one stop away.
Frequently asked questions
Is Gzira a good area to stay in Malta?
Yes, especially for stays of a week or more. Gzira sits on the harbour between Sliema and Valletta, with the seafront, supermarkets, delis, speciality coffee, bus stops, a police station and a health centre all within a few minutes' walk. It is residential and calm at night, but well connected by bus and by the Sliema ferry to Valletta.
Is Gzira safe for tourists?
Gzira is a residential town with lit streets and people out walking in the evening, and Gzira Police Station on Triq Belvedere is staffed around the clock. As anywhere, use normal city sense at night and keep valuables out of sight in parked cars.
What is near Morrison Court in Gzira?
Within about five minutes' walk of Morrison Court on Triq San Albert: the Chapel of Christ the Redeemer, Pjazza Meme Scicluna with its gazebo, corner bar and MaltaPost office, Loaf for speciality coffee, The White Sheep fine foods, Panina deli, grocery and convenience stores open until midnight, two butchers, barbers, Gzira Police Station, Gzira Health Centre, D'Argens Pharmacy, the Vilhena and Strand bus stops, the Novotel Malta Sliema with its public underground car park, and the seafront promenade.
Morrison Court is five self-contained apartments in a reimagined 1920s townhouse on Triq San Albert in Gzira, for couples and solo travellers staying from three nights to six months, with everything above within a five-minute walk. Check availability and book direct.
