Monaco last day

I am writing this 3 days late so my it may not sound as exciting as it really was at the time. After yesterdays big day at Cap Ferrat we decided just to have a quiet day in Monaco. As I have mentioned, I lived here in the early 80's and I had a recollection of a quiet village like area.

I remember the grand prix was on and I just wandered up to Cafe de Paris, grabbed a seat and watched part of the race. Now, the Cafe de Paris is huge, expanded sideways, backways and seems to have a casino below it as well. The main casino has also expanded to the left and is triple its original size. Up the hill next to the Hotel de Paris there was a movie theatre and offices - now I think the movie place is still there alongside every major prestige brand of clothes. The streets are packed with Bentlys being the Toyota of Monaco.

The rest of town must have been a property developers dream, there are huge blocks of apartments with a whole new little town called Fonteville added (also tax free and part of Monaco).

That said, it is still a pretty town and we walked way up the top behind it (yep, really steep) and enjoyed looking at the quaint apartments and villas dug into rock. There are some electic stairs and lifts but never where you happen to be.

When we got back down to the harbour we booked a small boat trip to see monaco from the water and while we had a hour to wait sat down for drinks. Cool place on the water with a signer guitarist who clearly didn't speak english but tried playing many rock classics. Satisfaction, Hotel California and Stairway to Heaven were all very strange when sung phonetically. Barbie had a Melon Granita which I guess is a fancy word for a slushy.

Boat trip was great, we got closer to the over the top mega boats and got a better perspective of town.

Had a great dinner near hotel at Il Terraso which was a napoli restaurant , super fresh ingredients and great wine. Entree was simple but so good - buffalo mozzarello, tomatos, basil and oil..