Hotel or not? Monaco is twenty minutes from Nice by train (€9,80 roundtrip per person). Though it is always enjoyable to get away, why spend the night out when we are only going twenty minutes from our Airbnb?
After much discussion and research we decided on a night out at Hotel Forum, which is situated a few minutes walk from the Monaco Monte Carlo train station in Beausoleil, France. It checks all the boxes: good reviews; free wi-fi; free breakfast; convenient location; and, most importantly, it is priced right (€120 per night in the off season).
We took the 9:20 AM train from Nice going to Monaco. At this time of day, the trains that run up and down the French Riviera are basically commuter trains. It was standing room only the entire trip, filled mostly with folks going to work in Monaco along with some tourists.
The Monaco Monte Carlo train station is underground, 15 stories below the upper entrance to the station (based on the elevator going from 0 to 14) and about 8 stories above sea level (educated guess here). It has several entrances and exits. Not knowing which to take, we guessed. Wrong.
We emerged in La Condamine, a neighborhood to the west of Port Hercule. A great place to exit the train station if arriving for a day trip, but not when your hotel is 15 stories uphill. Instead of working our way back through the train station, we walked uphill through the neighborhood. Thankfully we only carried one tote bag with us.
After our morning work out, we dropped our tote bag at Hotel Forum and headed straight to the train station to figure out how to navigate through it. As best we could determine, the 15 story elevator above the train station (top entrance/exit, then a 13 story parking garage, and finally the train station) is the simplest and easiest way to get from Beausoleil to most of the tourist areas in Monaco.
From the actual train platforms, head to the station’s western exit for La Condamine or take the eastern exit to pass by Église de Sainte-Dévote on your way to Port Hercule. To get to Monte Carlo or Beausoleil, follow the signs to the elevators and go up to the top. From there Monte Carlo is an easy walk downhill to the east.
Public elevators are seemingly found around every corner, but it is not always apparent where they lead. Monaco’s website has a map of the most useful elevators, but the map is not detailed and we found it difficult to use.
Whether you learn to navigate through the train station, on public elevators, or some combination of the two, do so quickly if you are not staying in the center of town near sea level. If in doubt, ask at your hotel.
Monaco is the most densely populated country in the world. This becomes apparently very quickly when you realize that the vast majority of the principality is covered by residential high rise buildings. The sheer volume of roads and buildings built onto the side of the mountains is quite impressive but not particularly interesting.
Our first destination was Monaco-Ville (a/k/a “The Rock”), the old historic district, to visit La Palais Princier de Monaco and Place du Palais (the palace and plaza). We purchased combination tickets, €25 each, to visit the palace and aquarium.
Before the palace tour begins, you’ll go through metal detectors and pick up an audio guide in your language of choice. Thankfully the audio guide comes with a lanyard so you can just wear it around your neck and ignore it if you prefer. The tour is entirely self-guided and goes through about a dozen rooms.
We finished the palace tour about 11:20 AM, just in time to line up for the changing of the guards ceremony that takes place each day at 11:55 AM. You might think that 30 minutes beforehand would be too early, but you would be wrong. Several buses arrived around 11:30 AM, disgorging dozens of senior citizens on the plaza. It was clear that these folks were told to go stand and wait for the show, because the area around the palace went from free and clear to absolutely packed in mere minutes.
The changing of the guards takes about five minutes and is reasonably interesting to watch. Bugle, drums, march, present arms, bugle, drums, turn, march, present arms, and so on.
Afterwards the crowd reformed into numerous tour groups and began walking around The Rock on whatever schedule they were on.
We stayed on The Rock for lunch at Arrow Burger which, according to its sign, has the best burgers in Monaco. I seriously doubt that is true but Arrow Burger has several things going for it, notably that the food is reasonably good, priced fairly (€13 for a burger, fries, and Coke), has seating in the shade, and is not frequented by tour groups.
After lunch we made the short walk over to the Cathédrale de Monaco for a quick look. From there it was straight to the Musée Océanographique de Monaco, a combination aquarium / museum founded by Price Albert I in the early 1900s.
The aquarium is found on the lower two floors, with the exhibits generally divided between the Mediterranean Ocean and Tropical Oceans. Overall the aquarium is a bit dated, reasonably good, but not great. I’m glad we went, but we would not return if we were to visit Monaco again.
The museum upstairs is dedicated to Antarctica and a history of seafaring exploration. We didn’t find the museum portion to be all that interesting.
We were surprised by the number of visitors there on a random Tuesday afternoon in early April. It was definitely more crowded than expected. Hopefully there is some measure of crowd control during the height of tourist season or it could be a disaster.
By mid-afternoon we were worn out. We set out to walk down The Rock, passing through Théâtre du Fort Antoine, around Port Hurcule, and up past Église de Sainte-Dévote to the Monaco Monte Carlo train station, where we rode the elevator to the top. After a short rest at the hotel we sauntered over to Carrefour City to pick up a couple of beers for the evening.
For dinner we eventually decided on Cooks Monaco because it was nearby, had decent reviews, a good selection of food, tolerable prices, and sidewalk seating. It was about as expected, meaning okay. Afterwards we strolled over to casino square in Monte Carlo and through the Jardin d’ Acclimatation (which has some of the best views of the city).
Hotel Forum has a rooftop terrace where Stephanie and I consumed a few cans of Kronenbourg and recapped the day which, according to her phone, consisted of about 26,000 steps covering 9.5 miles and 32 floors. Not bad.
Breakfast the next morning was typically European (lot of breads, cheeses, meats, and yogurt, with coffee and juice) and quite good. Having no plans to stay in Monaco for lunch, we filled up before heading out for the morning.
Our primary destination was La Collection Automobiles de S.A.S. le Prince de Monaco, the private automobile collection started by Prince Rainier III. The museum features 69 vehicles over two floors. The lower floor is largely classic cars from 1910 to 1970. The upper floor features race cars, Formula 1, Rally cars, and sports cars. If you like classic cars or races, this is a must destination. Admission to the museum is €10.
In the lobby there is a “professional” Formula 1 simulator that is available to be driven, €15 for seven minutes. I figured I’d need several minutes just to get up to speed on the simulator, so to truly enjoy it I was probably looking at €30 for fourteen minutes. I passed, but it was close. (If I had to guess, it was mid-tier simulator, having a single screen, not one of the high-end ones with multiple screens. But still cool nonetheless.)
Next we walked around town for a bit of final sightseeing before heading back through the train station, up the elevator to Beausoleil, and over to Hotel Forum to grab our overnight bag before catching the 12:20 PM train to Nice.
During the course of our visit we managed to walk most of the track for the Grand Prix of Monaco. Though it was over a month before the race, most of the grandstands were up, race control and pit lane were largely in place, and the installation of track barriers was well underway. Seeing the preparations for the race was one of the highlights of our trip.
Unless you want to spend time gambling in Casino de Monte-Carlo or browse stores for the rich, famous, and ultra wealthy, one or two days in Monaco is more than enough time to see the highlights. It was a great side trip.
Garrett and Stephanie
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