Monaco, a tiny land of casinos

Prince's Palace, Monaco, March 2020

Monaco is the second-smallest country in the world, after the Vatican City. I visited on the last day of my truncated microstates itinerary around Europe. 

Having arrived in Nice on a surprisingly pleasant and memorable overnight coach journey from Lyon, I made the short walk through the deserted Niçard streets to a train station. Conveniently, the coach station is right next to the Nice Riquier commuter rail station, which even happens to be one stop closer along the line to Monaco than the main Nice Ville station. I'd even arrived in Nice an hour early, so had some extra time to play with in the microstate as well. 

TER from Nice Riquier

The journey from Nice Riquier to Monaco Monte Carlo was only 21 minutes. The train was somewhat busy as it was very much the morning peak, but that didn't really matter for such a short journey. 

Monaco Monte Carlo station. It even has direct trains to Moscow on the Nice-Moscow route, the longest direct train entirely in Europe. 

Monaco Monte Carlo station is the only one in the country, so I have now visited All the Stations in Monaco. The station has a small tourist office, but this was closed as it was still only around 8AM, so I went for a walk to the main urban centre to go and explore this smallest of non-pontifical microstates. 

Sainte Dévote Chapel

The sights began immediately - directly outside the station lies the Sainte Dévote Chapel, dedicated to St Devota, the patron saint of Monaco. It's nicely nestled between the rocks of the principality, though it's also under a concrete road bridge as well. 

After a short climb up the hill from the Fontvielle district to the famous Monte Carlo, I went to the main post office to buy a stamp as a souvenir. They're common enough souvenirs that there was even a dedicated counter for philately, though this hadn't opened at this point in the morning. The lady at the counter made a point of showing me that my change was in Monégasque Euro coins - something of a novelty. 

Monaco issues its own stamps as a full member of the UPU, and issues Euros under a monetary agreement with the ECB. 

The Monte Carlo Casino itself was underwhelming from the outside. There was major road maintenance taking place outside, which did somewhat detract from the Belle Époque design of the casino. I had considered going in and making some kind of token bet on something, but the entry fee into the cheapest room was €30 without having even bet on anything. Even the non-betting tourist entry was €17, which I couldn't really justify. Maybe I'll return at some point if €30 ever becomes a small amount of money just for the novelty of gambling in one of the most (if not the most) famous casinos in the world. 

Monte Carlo Casino, with lots of road maintenance. 

There's a very nice garden in front of the casino, though, with several themed sections. 

Casino Gardens, Monte Carlo

One of the things I'd been looking forward to was to get a free passport stamp from the tourist office, but it turned out that just a couple of weeks before my visit they stopped doing this. They still gave out a nice passport-shaped booklet though, which was nice but not quite the same. 

Commemorative booklet and stamps of both varieties

The Monte Carlo marina was as full of fancy yachts as one might expect, though I was surprised that there were a few small boats that weren't that different to the ones you might find on a British river. 

Port Hercule, Monte Carlo. The Monégasque flag is identical to the Indonesian flag (and upside-down Polish flag and lots of others) except for its aspect ratio. 

I'd been mostly underwhelmed up to this point by a country that seemed to be mostly roads, but the climb up to Old Monaco was much more scenic. 

Opéra de Monaco

St Nicolas Cathedral, Old Monaco

The old city was a classic European maze of narrow streets and alleyways, much more pleasant and interesting and historic to wander around than the showing-off of the bay below. 

View from Vieux Monaco over Port Hercule marina. 

As a principality, it even had a changing of the guard at noon. There weren't many other tourists - a completely different experience to the scrum of Buckingham Palace - I've seen both, and this was much more enjoyable. 

Ceremonial procession to the changing of the guard

Changing of the Guard in front of the Prince's Palace

I didn't have that much more time, though, so it was time to get some lunch. The only place I found with reasonable prices was the Monte Carlo McDonalds, but that served me fine and even had a route through mazes of tunnels back to the station. 

Views over the Mediterranean bays on the train back to Nice

Monaco was a very interesting day trip. The entire cost was only €5.70 return on train tickets from Nice, two stamps for €1.40 each as souvenirs, and the usual price of a McDonalds meal. Maybe some day I'll return and visit the casino just to know that I've done it, but if so then it would cost me much more than £10 for a day trip... 

Summary: 

Date: Wednesday 11th March 2020

Main experience: A pleasant old town on top of the hill, much more enjoyable than the nouveaux-riches around the port. 

Cost: ~£10 for the whole day. Plenty of people spend much, much more than that in Monaco.