Maltese Islands
Comino and the Blue Lagoon
How to do Comino's Blue Lagoon without the midday scrum: which boat to take from Sliema, Buġibba or Marfa, what it really costs in euros, and why almost everyone arrives at exactly the wrong time.
In short
Comino and the Blue Lagoon at a glance
Comino is a 3.5 km² island between Malta and Gozo with one full-time resident family, no cars and no roads — and the single most photographed swimming spot in the country, the Blue Lagoon, a shallow turquoise channel between Comino and the islet of Cominotto. The whole island is a day trip: a boat from Sliema (~45–60 min) or the short hop from Marfa/Ċirkewwa (~25 min) drops you for a few hours of swimming, then takes you back. The catch is timing — between roughly 11am and 3pm in July and August the lagoon is genuinely overrun, with hundreds of boats and a wall of deckchair and inflatable hawkers. Come early or late and it's a different, calmer island.
The Blue Lagoon is the picture that sells Malta — a shallow channel of impossibly clear turquoise between Comino and the little islet of Cominotto — and it earns the photograph, just not in the way the photograph implies. What the image leaves out is that Comino is a 3.5 km² rock with one resident family, no cars and no shop, and that on a July afternoon the same water carries hundreds of boats and a small army of deckchair and inflatable hawkers. Almost everyone arrives between eleven and three, which is precisely the window to avoid. Come on the first boat or stay for the late-afternoon emptying and you get the lagoon people think they’re booking.
The mistake first-timers make is treating Comino as a destination rather than a swim. There’s nowhere to stay, nothing to buy beyond a few overpriced kiosks, and the cruise itself — past Gozo’s caves and the swim stops — is half of what you’re paying the Sliema and Buġibba operators for. If all you want is the lagoon and you’re up north or on Gozo, the little Marfa ferry does it for a fraction of the price in twenty-odd minutes. And once you’ve had your swim, the move that separates a good day from a crowded one is simply walking away: fifteen minutes over the headland to sandy Santa Marija Bay or the quieter Crystal Lagoon, which the day-trippers almost never reach.
The route
Comino isn't somewhere you tour — it's a half-day swim with a few good escapes from the crowd if you know where to walk. The only real decisions are which boat you take and what time you arrive; get the timing right and you avoid 90% of the problem. Times below are real crossings from the main departure points.
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Morning
First boat to the Blue Lagoon
Aim for the 9–9.30am departure from Marfa (~25 min) or the early Sliema cruise (~45–60 min). Arriving before 10.30am means an hour or two of the lagoon close to empty, with the water at its clearest before the boat traffic stirs up the sand.
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Midday
Walk away from the lagoon
As the crowds land, walk 10–15 minutes over the headland to Santa Marija Bay (the island's only sandy beach, shaded by tamarisk trees) or to the smaller Crystal Lagoon on the south side, reachable by boat or a scramble. Both stay quiet while the main lagoon fills.
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Afternoon
Comino Tower & the cliffs
Saint Mary's Tower (Comino Tower), the 1618 Knights-era watchtower used as a film location, is a 20-minute walk up from the lagoon and free to look at from outside. The clifftop paths give the best views and almost nobody walks them.
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Late afternoon
Last swim, last boat
By 3.30–4pm the day-cruise crowds start leaving and the lagoon empties out again — a good window for a final swim. Check your return time carefully: the last scheduled Marfa ferry and the last cruise pickups vary by operator and season, and missing it on a near-uninhabited island is a real problem.
Where to base yourself
Pick one or two bases rather than moving every night.
Sliema or St Julian's (Malta)
££ mid-rangeThe practical base for visiting Comino: nearly every full-day Blue Lagoon cruise leaves from Sliema's seafront, and you can be back for dinner. You sleep on the main island with everything to hand and treat Comino as a single day out.
Best for: Most visitors — a day trip from a Malta base
Buġibba & St Paul's Bay (north Malta)
££ mid-rangeThe other big cruise departure point and closer to Comino than Sliema, with cheaper, more package-style accommodation. Handy if you also want Mellieħa's sandy beaches and the Gozo ferry within easy reach.
Best for: Families and beach weeks visiting by cruise
Gozo (Marsalforn or Xlendi)
££ mid-rangeComino sits right between Malta and Gozo, so a Gozo base puts the short Marfa-side ferries and Gozo's own boat trips within reach. Pair a slow few nights on Gozo with an early Comino morning before the Sliema cruises arrive.
Best for: Slow travellers combining Gozo and Comino
Getting around Comino and the Blue Lagoon
There are no roads, cars or taxis on Comino — once you land you walk, and the whole island is small enough to cross on foot in under half an hour. Getting there is the only logistics question. The cheapest, quickest route is the small passenger ferry from Marfa (Ċirkewwa side) in Malta's far north, about a 25-minute crossing for roughly €13 return, reached by Tallinja bus 41/42 from Valletta or 222 along the coast. Full-day cruises from Sliema and Buġibba cost more (~€30–45) but include the scenic coastline and several swim stops; they're a day out rather than a transfer. From Gozo, operators run short boats across in 25–35 minutes. Wear something on your feet — the lagoon edges are rock, not sand — and bring water and food, because the island's handful of kiosks are pricey and sell out on busy days.
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