Malta Island, June 23^rd 2004.

Recording of traditional boats by Jean-Marie Gassend.

With the last dives carried out yesterday at Gnejna Bay, the underwater activities of the training course have been completed. Not less than three hundred dives were carried out.

Today the trainees were once again in the hands of Jean-Marie Gassend who gave them a detailed explanation of how to record the shape of a hull by taking a series of successive transverse sections. Then from the theory to practice: the trainees grouped in pairs to tackle the record a local boat that was on the hard in the small port of Mellieha.

	Plate with marbled decoration.

Here the traditional boats have raised stems and the colors are sharp and numerous. At Marsaxlokk one meets the greatest number of boats because it is also the most active fishing port.
Marsaxlokk is sometimes named in old documents as Marsasirocco: Marsa meaning port and xlokk (X pronounced as CH) is the Maltese name of the famous sirocco.

While the trainees at work we sorted out the documents and objects discovered during the excavation. These are very few and undoubtedly the ceramics found have are probably not related to our phantom wreck, but record them anyway in order to keep the memory of it..

The most significant piece is a plate with marbled decoration that could be dated to the 17^th century originating from Italy.