It seems there is no age limit when it comes to falling in love. Stephanie Fsadni meets a newly-wed British septuagenarian couple who never ever thought they would fall in love again after losing their respective spouses... until they met each other in Malta last year.

Among the many who visited the Festa Frawli in Mġarr last weekend was a newly-wed septuagenarian couple from the UK.

Sheila Snowden, 79, and Geoffrey Lant, 77, tied the knot last Friday, at the same hotel where they met approximately a year ago. They then took their circa 70 wedding guests, who included Maltese and foreign friends and members of their families, to the strawberry fair on Sunday. The couple hired two coaches for the occasion and afterwards, they treated their guests to tea and cake.

The strawberry fair holds a special place in the couple’s hearts, as it is where they had their first ‘date’.

Widow Sheila was on her 10th visit to the island in April 2015 and, as in her previous visits, she stayed at the Bella Vista Hotel in Qawra.

Geoffrey was on his first holiday on his own since his wife died of motor neurone disease after 38 years of marriage in August 2014. He had been to Malta some 20 years before and was eager to visit again. He booked his stay at the Bella Vista.

Sheila says it was mere coincidence that they met a couple of days before his holiday was coming to an end, as she switched her mealtime at the hotel from dinner to lunch.

“I had spotted him one evening dancing with another lady at the hotel. Then I was having lunch and he was eating on his own,” she says. “We soon started chatting, and among other things I told him about the strawberry fair which was taking place the following day. I invited him to go there and we went along with a German couple.”

“It was a lovely day,” reminisces Sheila.

The two got along well and also visited Mellieħa and St Paul’s Bay together. As his holiday wrapped up, they exchanged numbers but there was no apparentintention to take this newly-formed friendship further.

A couple of days later, in fact, Sheila received an SMS in which Geoffrey thanked her for the company but told her that he didn’t want to “lead her on”. Sheila was not expecting anything, so she was pretty unfazed by the message. However, he soon had a change of heart.

Geoffrey’s exactly how I used to picture my ideal man

On her way back home to the Isle of Man, she stopped over in Liverpool for the weekend. When she landed there, it was raining cats and dogs and she had some 35 kilos of luggage to carry along. The situation looked pretty dismal until, much to her surprise, she found Geoffrey waiting for her at the arrivals lounge.

“He told me he wanted to help me with the luggage,” she says. “I couldn’t believe it. He had driven some 150 kilometres just to take my suitcases to the hotel!”

“I just wanted to see her,” Geoffrey admits.

He accompanied her to the hotel but returned home in Aldridge immediately after to feed his dog. The following day he drove the same distance again to spend the day with her and romance soon blossomed.

In six weeks’ time, they decided to get married but it wasn’t too easy to break the news to family and friends.

“I found it quite difficult. You know, for the past years, I’ve always been saying that I’ll never ever fall in love again,” claims Sheila, who had been married for22 years.

Their families, especially, were not too enthusiastic.

Geoffrey and Sheila during their wedding celebrations.

“When I told my daughter, she just about tore my head off. But then she met him and realised what a lovable guy he is,” she says.

Two of Sheila’s children passed away years ago. She lost her son when he was 21 and her daughter died of Lupus at the age of 28, leaving a six-month-old baby behind, who’s now turned 25.

As regards Geoffrey, his stepdaughters gave him no option but to choose between them and her, and he chose Sheila.

“They were calling me a gold digger and so on, but it’s not the case at all,” says Sheila, who is an antiques dealer.

Geoffrey, a retired stock controller, also gave up a chance to sing with his choir at the Royal Albert Hall in London last October in order to be with her.

Sheila appreciates all he’s done for her and is still incredulous about how they met.

“I keep thinking: ‘How did it happen?’ It’s all because I changed my dinner to lunch. I never, never, never thought I’d fall in love again,” she keeps repeating.

Her love for him is evident; her eyes shine as she speaks about him.

“Do you know how when you’re young, you dream about how your ideal man would be? Geoffrey’s exactly how I used to picture him,” she says enthusiastically. “And there’s nothing he doesn’t like about me!”

The more taciturn Geoffrey nods in agreement and says the feeling is mutual.

“We’re like two peas in a pod. We share so many things together. We love dancing, bridge…,” she continues.

“We just hope to live a long life together,” adds Geoffrey, who survived breast cancer three-and-a-half years ago, has a pacemaker and a blocked artery.

Their wedding celebrations will continue in Duns, Scotland, next month, and inJune the couple will go on a honeymoon cruise to the fjords to be followed by another cruise to Australia, New Zealand and Singapore in October, when Sheila turns 80.

But they will end the year in Malta as they intend to come back in December. Then they’re returning again next year, in February, and will stay on the island for about three months because they want to celebrate their wedding anniversary here, right where it all started.