Blue Lagoon

The Blue Lagoon is the channel between Comino and the islet of Cominotto, in the Maltese archipelago between Malta and Gozo. Comino has an area of about three and a half square kilometres and a permanent population that has at times been counted in single figures.

The water is the record. A shallow sand bottom between two limestone islands produces a colour that is genuinely as photographed, and it made the lagoon one of the most visited sites in Malta. That visitation broke it: on peak days the lagoon received thousands of people on an area of sand a few dozen metres across, with deckchairs and kiosks covering it and the seabed suffering from anchoring and sunscreen. From 2023 Malta imposed a cap — limited deckchairs, restricted kiosks, controlled boat numbers and a ban on hawking — and the site is now managed rather than open.

There is almost no sand: the lagoon is entered from rock ledges and a small beach, and the water deepens quickly. Snorkelling is good along the Cominotto side. The rest of Comino is a bird sanctuary and Natura 2000 site with walking paths, an old tower and nobody on them, which is where anyone wanting quiet should go. Comino was effectively abandoned in the twentieth century and its permanent population has at times been two people.

Access is by ferry from Ċirkewwa on Malta or Mġarr on Gozo, or by tour boat. Nothing on the island is open in winter. Santa Marija Bay on the far side of Comino has sand, shade and almost nobody, and Gozo's Ramla Bay is twenty minutes on from the Mġarr ferry.

Malta capped this in 2023 after the lagoon stopped coping — limited deckchairs, controlled boats, no hawking — and it worked without emptying the place. Come before ten or after five, or walk twenty minutes to Santa Marija Bay, where there is sand, shade and nobody at all.