Interesting, yes, a poster corrected me over at the Air Malta forum. I wonder if it’s a bit like what easyJet did back in the late 1990s with TEA Switzerland (or TEA Basel?) when they set up what turned out to be a successful base in Geneva.

Incidentally, for those low fares I used jetcost.de which farmed me out to edreams.de, where I had to pay by direct bank transfer (Giropay) in Germany. Another, lastminute.de, offered amazing discounts if you could pay with a Diners Club card which I don’t have. FlyGo in Spain offered ridiculous prices if paying with an AMEX but I wasn’t able to put a purchase through.

Be careful with all these OTAs and check the final price before you click COMPRA or KAUFEN or whatever. In several of my attempts the price had sneakily leapt up to over 100 Euros without warning me (presumably depending on the payment method used). In these cases, the box with the amount indicated was conveniently out of sight, requiring scrolling back up. I think a lot of these outfits are what you call in Germany a Saftladen.