Today we caught the train to Monaco. We arrived at the station and bought our tickets and we were told to get to the platform quickly as the train was running 10 minutes late and we should be able to catch it. It was actually more than 10 minutes late and we had plenty of time. It is only about a 40 minute trip and we seemed to be there very quickly.
The station at Monaco is clean and all marble and very nice compared to the other stations we have been to. We walked out of the station past the Le Devote church and onto the main street. We wandered around looking for somewhere to have brunch but very little was open until down by the port we found a restaurant that was happy to open early for us but would only do a limited menu for us. (It was 10.50am and they opened at 11am for breakfast and lunch etc) so work that one out! Anyway, we had a lovely omelette, chips and bread with tea and coffee and we were ready to walk briskly up the hill to the palace in time for the changing of the guard. Phew! We made it, not easy on a full stomach! The changing of the guard was full of fanfare and a marching band and we could not see much for the crowd. We wandered around the streets and shops and had a nice time. We caught the tourist train and did the tour and then we bought tickets for the tour of the palace and the car museum.
The tour of the palace was very interesting and a good insight to the reception rooms and throne room that are used on important occasions as well as the bedrooms that were used for royal visitors. It was really nice. The other wings of the palace are the private rooms of Prince Albert and his family and the rooms for the guards and servants.
The car museum was the Prince’s personal collection and he had a lot of them in mint condition. Gerard, Michael and Nick were in their element. Their cameras did not stop clicking for an hour. I enjoyed it too. We left the car museum and caught the bus to the Casino. Well, once again the guys were in car heaven, spending all their time taking photos of the cars parked around the casino. They had a ball! We were going to have a wine there but the prices were ridiculous, 5 euro for water, 10 euro for a beer, 8 euro for a wine etc. So we decided to head back to the train station and go home, after all it was about 6pm by now and we had had a lovely day.
We caught the train back to Nice and walked home via the supermarket for wine, 3 euro per bottle, bread, 90 euro cents, and some ham and prosciutto. We had a lovely meal of bread, meats, cheeses, tomatoes, olives, pesto and caviar dip. We enjoyed Monaco again, the magnificent boats in the harbour, the gorgeous clean and safe shopping areas and the palace and car museum.
