Monaco Mayhem

  Monte Carlo, Monaco
Tuesday, October 2, 2007

Since we were in the neighbourhood anyway, we decided to take a trip to Monaco today. Adding to our list of random republics visited (also including Liechtenstein, Vatican City and San Marino, for those of you keeping track!), Monaco is apparently the second smallest country in the world, with an official population of around 7, 000. It is only a half hour bus ride from the French Riviera town of Nice, and well worth it for the sheer glitz and glamour of one of the wealthiest populations anywhere.

Just Like James Bond

From the minute we arrived in downtown Monte Carlo, it was like stepping into a James Bond movie. Gorgeous, designer-clothes wearing women and cigar-smoking men congregated around the line of Ferraris in front of the casino, and Jaguar and Mazeratti car dealerships selling vehicles worth the GDP of several small African countries lined the streets. Dazed-looking tourists, slightly bedazzled by the sheer ostentatiousness of it all, wandered through the sculptured gardens and gently tinkling fountains and looked longingly into the obscenely expensive designer store windows. Every ice cream stand was Hagen Daaz, and we eventually caved and bought a ridiculously expensive bowl of Caramel Apple Crumble ice cream to savour as we meandered the streets.

Hagen Daaz and Casino's

We had heard that the aquarium, (or Musee de Oceanographic de Monaco, because even the names are fancy here!), was really good, so we walked along the harbour packed with super yachts the size of a small town in New Zealand and found the building perched on a cliff front facing the water, obviously designed to be seen from that vantage point by the huge numbers of yacht-owning visitors.

Cliffside Aquarium

Since we didn't have to worry about the hassles of valet-parking our yacht, we walked right up and checked out the incredible oceanarium, complete with dozens of brilliantly coloured tropical fish, sharks, stingrays, octopi, seahorses, jellyfish, and a giant 2 metre long Caribbean eel. It really was incredible, and we spent a good couple of hours there before heading back into town to find the tourist office and get our obligatory passport stamp (sooooo touristy, I know!). Our bus back to Nice was packed with people, and it was almost a relief to get back to the hostel that night with other similarly shabby and bedraggled looking backpackers after spending the day surrounded by so many beautiful people!

Gabrielle and the Fish Tank

All our best from Monaco,

Dan and Gabrielle