Money, money, money…

must be funny, in a rich man’s world!

One square kilometre of opulence

And where else can you find such a concentration of millionaires, billionaires, and gazillionaires except in Monaco where there is no income tax! Famous residents include people such as Shirley Bassey, Ringo Starr and more recently Novak Djokovic, Caroline Wozniacki, Jenson Button amongst others. Nonetheless, you don’t have to have a million bucks to enjoy Monaco as some things in life are indeed free.

First, each car park in Monte Carlo offers free parking for one hour. So being typically Singaporean, we ended up moving our car amongst the various car parks to enjoy this privilege. Its not as bad as it sounds as we managed to go to quite a few different spots and admire the sea view from there.

Rich cars, fast cars, nowhere to drive...

Next while you do have to pay 10 euros to enter the Monte Carlo Casino, you can wander at least as far as the grand foyer to take a look. No photos are allowed but you can always watch Never Say Never Again  (the one with Sean Connery) as the casino is featured. Unless you are there to gamble, I think its actually a lot more fun to be outside the casino where all the expensive cars are parked and just people watch. We saw some seriously weird cars like a chrome Bugatti Veyron and the 4 door Porsche but without door handles. For the truly rich, it seems a simple Ferrari or Lamborghini will no longer do, and they have to up the stakes to find a car that stands out amongst all the rest.

Monte Carlo Casino

Finally, the various churches as well as the beach are free as well! We went into Saint Nicholas Cathedral, where many of the Grimaldis (the ruling family of Monaco) were buried, including Grace Kelly and Prince Rainer III. We also popped into Saint Charles Church, where the bell tower is 108 feet above sea level.

We did pay to enter the State Apartments and it was honestly quite disappointing and totally not worth the money spent. All in all, Monte Carlo was quite an eye-opener and definitely worth a visit.

Awaken your senses

Seeing as we were in the perfume region of France, and probably the world, we had to visit some perfume factories. Thus we made our way to two of the most well-known fragrance houses in France, Molinard and Fragonard.

Traditional methods of drying flower petals

Both run factory tours on a daily basis and as most of the visitors tend to be French, we were rather the odd couple there. The tours were fairly interesting however since we have already been to the L’Occitane factory tour, some of the content were rather similar. For one of the fragrance houses (can’t remember which one), they actually didn’t have a resident ‘Nose’ instead they reply on freelancers. When they want to create a new fragrance, they use something like a tender/ bidding process so they can select the best fragrance out there. There is only one school, ISIPCA, in the world for budding perfumers to attend, as past perfumers usually enter the trade through apprenticeships. Of course the most exciting or fun part about the tour was when we get to go to the retail shop and smell all the lovely perfumes!!! The array of perfumes, body lotions etc were a bit overwhelming and since I had already gone crazy at L’Occitane, I thought it was best to practice some restraint and only bought some face creams.

Where the nose gets to work 

After a fairly educational morning, we visited the Villa & Jardins Ephrussi de Rothschild as I had read that the gardens were simply beautiful and it was a must-see.

Jardin Ephrussi de Rothschild

The exterior of the villa was painted pink which sounds hideous but is actually not too bad in real-life. The interiors were also beautifully decorated, and while the villa looked small from the outside, there were enough rooms to keep you occupied. It was quite modern for its time, with attached bathrooms and bathtubs for each room and also a telephone. There were even 2 stuffed animals in her bedroom! However, we were here for the gardens and that’s what we did.

Inside the Villa

There are a total of 8 different themed gardens, French, Spanish, Florentine Stone, Japanese, Exotic, Provencal and Rose, and it was wonderful to walk through them.  The flowers were in bloom and it felt like we were walking through a very lovely bottle of perfume. The view of the coastline was also gorgeous and we could spy other mansions from where we were. All in all, a really wonderful way to end our day and also our time in Nice!

In the Gardens

Nicely nice

After the excitement of the tennis matches the day before, we decided to take it easy the next day and woke up on a lazy Saturday to visit the famous markets of Nice. There are quite a few markets and I actually can’t remember which ones we visited, suffice to say they were full of character and it was quite fun wandering around looking at the various produce. Nice is one of those places in Europe which is blessed with a lovely Mediterranean climate, thus very suitable for growing all kinds of lovely flowers, fruits and vegetables.

Spices and fruits

We managed to wander down to the beach, which was seriously not that difficult, and find a place that wasn’t yet over-run by the locals in search of brunch on a Saturday. The beach looked lovely and though the sun was out, I thought the sea breeze made it a little too chilly for sunbathing though the locals certainly didn’t think so. And in case you are wondering, yes there were people who went topless. The beach didn’t look that crowded though, probably because it was still April and not peak season yet.

Soaking in the sun
(what may seem like a full cafe usually has empty seats inside)

Spot the topless lady

We ended up whiling the day away just wandering the streets and up a hill to Parc du Chateau. Its a public garden 92m up with panoramic views of the city. We also managed to locate the Russian Orthodox Cathedral, which is supposed to be an architectural sight to behold. It was a little difficult to find and was kind of hidden from view amongst the various residential houses around, only when you are actually right in front of it do you realize that its there. There was a service when we were there so we could only take a little peek at the interiors. It was seriously quite beautiful and since we didn’t want to interrupt or be rude, we only took a short peek and left. The grounds were huge and there were some Russian families with their kids just hanging out and playing. As the cathedral is kind of isolated from the rest of the area due to the huge grounds, it can feel a little like you are actually in Russia itself. Pretty lovely to just sit on one of the benches and take in the architecture. Apparently there is some ownership dispute going on over the property, you can read all about it here and here. I think the French are just taking it in their very French way which is probably the best way of managing it.

Cétait bien!

We finished the day walking down the Promenade des Anglais and thought that Nice was c'était bien!