Learn To Water Ski

Think Malta and you almost immediately and inevitably think sea! Think sea and you think fun! And there’s not much more fun to be had on the sea than by lashing a pair of planks to your feet and being dragged along the surface of the water behind a speedboat - or by water skiing, as I believe it’s more popularly known.

Waterskiing is often close to, if not on top of most people's ‘wannado’ list. And since the waters around the Maltese islands are warm all year round, rarely dropping to below 13C even in winter, this is the ideal place to have a go. Or, as far as you beginners out there are concerned, it’s an ideal location to learn.

Water skiing is an all-year-round sport in Malta with many beachside hotels on the island, and over the sea in Gozo, offering water skiing services during the summer. As an activity, it’s been around for as long as boats have existed that are fast enough to pull people along behind them without them sinking.

To be more precise, it began in the United States in 1922 when a teenager called Ralph Samuelson figured that if you could ski on snow then, if you had sufficient speed, you could surely do something similar on the surface of water.

And so intrepid Ralph strapped two barrel staves to his feet and rigged a clothesline up to his motorboat on Lake Pepin in Lake City, Minnesota. He got his brother, Ben, to drive and after a few days of experimentation and a switch to snow skis and then purposely-built waterskis, the 18-year-old had invented what would turn out to be a global past-time!

The sport remained a little-known activity, with Johnson as its daredevil pioneer for several years. He began taking his ‘stunts’ on the road, performing shows for audiences gathered in places as far afield as Detroit and Florida.


Numerous claims began to surface as to who was the first water skier, but in 1966 the American Water Ski Association formally acknowledged Ralph as the first water skier on record.

Water skiing in Malta cannot claim to go back that far, but the sport quickly gained popularity during the 1960s when the Island's tourist drive had just been successfully launched. This resulted in a development and economic boom that has, of course, since had its fits and starts.

But the skiing, thank goodness, has continued to grow in popularity and is practiced pretty much anywhere on the island where there’s a man with a speedboat with permission and a line to tow someone along.

Visitors to the island will find it very easy to find places to hire skis and get instruction in the art. Expect to pay in the region of €40 to €50 for 30-minute lessons with all equipment provided.