Luxury On Point

As I was pulling into our garage, a red Ferrari, a yellow Lamborghini, a blue Maserati, a black Rolls-Royce, and a white Bentley were all lined up trying to get into the parking structure of our apartment complex.  It brought back memories of our trip to France.  In Spring 2015, we attended the F1 Monaco Grand Prix.  That was a surreal experience!  Fancy cars, yachts, helicopters, champagne, cigars, Birkins, Chanel, designer clothes, bling.....were everywhere.  And yet with all that oozing wealth, it still screamed class.  Crowded, but classy.  There were still areas were bus loads of tourists - rude and stinky - hovered the streets of Monaco.  There was so much wealth that you almost oversee all the chaos going around.  That's the tricky part about visiting places during peak season, the elbow-to-elbow-comes-in-bus-loads-of-people crowd.  How did we manage?  We had to choose, plan, and move wisely.  It may be more costly, but you get what you pay for.

Monaco Grand Prix

Port De Fontvieille, Monaco

Monaco-Ville

A forced smile while standing in between the mad crowd

When I went in 2011, it wasn't peak season.  Everywhere was calm and easy to go around.  You see more of the locals and a clearer picture of what Monaco looks like on a normal day - like the yacht-lined harbor, glitzy casinos, helicopters, designer boutiques, and fancy restaurants.  Just kidding!  Peak season or non-peak season, their lifestyle doesn't change; just the quantity of tourists visiting their wealthy independent microstate.

We can definitely say that Monaco is very clean, buildings are almost too perfect to be real, and smaller than what you expect -- but absolutely every bit of perfection!  We highly recommend that you visit this beautiful place when the famous F1 Grand Prix is NOT going on, unless you absolutely do not mind the mad crowd and road closures.  Either way, it will still be a win-win situation.  It's Monaco for heaven's sake!

More pictures are available in the Galería.