Yard 32

Yard 32 sits at number 32 Strait Street, the shoulder-wide lane that ran wild in the first half of the twentieth century as the drinking quarter for Mediterranean fleets, full of music halls, barmaids and blurred lines. The street's revival over the last decade has been led by small bars like this one, and Yard 32 wears the history well. The menu is built around gin: over 200 bottlings, served with a card of forty-odd tapas that lean Maltese and Spanish. There is live music on many evenings and tables out in the alley, where the stone walls keep the summer heat off and conversation carries from one table to the next whether you invited it or not. The bar markets itself as gay-friendly and shows up in the LGBTQ+ guides to Malta, and on a street with Strait Street's past that feels less like a marketing line and more like continuity. Hours run Wednesday to Sunday from 6.30pm to about 1am. Pair it with Kween two streets over on Merchant Street for the compact Valletta queer circuit.