Weather - Beautiful (yet again) sunny & 16-25C
We awoke to yet another sunny day. Showered etc & off to breakfast on the Horizen Terrace .... stunning views and outdoors. Had some fresh fruit (cheeries, pineapple, blood oranges & kiwi fruit), then an omelet made in 2 minutes whilst you watch ... yum!
Back to our room to pack for our tour on Monaco & the Prince's Palace. We all met in the foyer at 9am & boarded a nice coach with an english speaking French guide. He took us all around the small city, then we parked the coach in the underground parking lot & took the escalators to the top of the rock. Then a nice walk and lot's of photo stops;
Palace from a distance:
On through the botanical gardens which were beautiful:
Then we walked to the Church of Immaculate Conception (Roman Catholic is the standard religion of Monaco) where the crypts of all the royal family of Monaco are:
It was hard to get decent inside photos, but here are a few:
Next we had tickets to go inside the Royal Palace. No photos were allowed, which was disappointing, but we had an audio guide so were able to visit all the rooms and have commentry in english. The garden was beautiful as well, but still no photos allowed :(
After we came outside there were heaps of tourists arriving for the daily changing of the guide & it was impossible to find a decent viewing area. So we were hot & thirst by this stage & found a nice little cafe nearby & had a beer. Within 10 minutes we were joined by 4 others from our group.
We had a choice of meeting the coach & tour guide at 12.20 to be taken back to our hotel, or staying up in the area & catching a local bus back down. We chose the latter & went walking, browsing the many shops. Eventually Mike found a hat & shirt he liked with the MC logo (his initials) & I found a nice everyday carry bag.
Lunch was at a lovely little Italian Restaurant, Pasta Roca, we shared an antipasta plate with beautiful vegitables (eggplant, capsicum, mushrooms, zuccini etc) then a pizza with, proschuto, ricotta, mozzarella & rocket. It was just beautiful! Of course we then shared a bottle of the local Rose, it is much lighter in colour than what we get in Australia, but much nicer.
The Pizza had been cut in half & I started it before remembering to take a photo!
Then off to find the local bus & buy tickets. That was an experience in itself as the ticket machine was all in French. We managed to feed in some coins & 2 tickets were delivered. They scanned OK on the bus, but we discovered we had selected the "senior" version for locals only as they pay 1.5euro & we should have paid 2euro. Anyway they worked and we managed to jump off at the correct spot so all good.
Will upload some photos and then have my afternoon nap. The others have organised to meet at 6.30 in the lobby for yet another noisy dinner!
I'm sure I have said before just how much we love this place .... just can't afford to live here! Looked at some real estate today & thought this was good value ... just 5.4 million euros!!
More tomorrow after we return from a tour to Grass'e (France's perfume capital).
Betty & Mike
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