More Monaco

We slept with our patio door open last night and were treated to the sound of the sea. Only the good stuff too, the rhythmic slapping of the waves on the hotel. It's like the Monagans took all those extra annoying bits from the sea and did away with them. No squawking sea gulls, heavy sea smell, foghorns or bugs.

They tend to do a lot of things like that here. The place is immaculate, the roads are in good shape and you feel safe walking anywhere at any time. I guess you can do a lot more when you have such a small population. Good to see that they have a handle on the graffiti problems that we saw in Geneva and Genoa. It seemed that in those cities every wall that wasn't a major storefront had some sort of tag on it. You do have to tip your cap to the fact that it was a better class of graffiti than we're used to in America and Canada. Almost all of it was politically or socially motivated.

We could have used some authorities to control the unruly mobs at the Oceanographic Museum. It was insanely busy with, with hordes of children running between the tanks shouting for their parents. Getting through the aquarium and museum at our usual pace was impossible. But we soldiered on. I'm not sure if I'd recommend the contents of the Museum/Aquarium to others, but I would surely nominate the building itself as a must-see. It sits right on the cliff face, towering several stories up all draped in columns and looking very regal. The inside matches the outside; the staircases are elaborately carved, the walls and ceilings painted in fabulous colors and amazing mosaic floors. A+ for building, B- for the displays.

The museum was also hosting a traveling Damien Hirst exhibition. He is one weird dude. He has created displays of whole animals stuck in glass, and then cut in half so you can see all the insides. Another display was of these large canvas butterfly paintings, which looked absolutely stunning from across the room. Your heart kind of falls, though, when you get up close and realize they are not painted but composed of the mounted wings of hundreds of butterflies. Kind of put me off a little.

I think the highlight for me today was a bit of our trip across from Monte Carlo to Monaco-ville. We took a boat across the harbour to cut some time off the trip and then traversed the floating dyke to a path running along the cliffs toward the museum, cathedral and palace. I don't know if everyone else was unaware of this route, but Fiona and I are were mostly alone. We took our time on the walk, dipping our toes in the Mediterranean off the floating dyke, doing a spot of birdwatching and just enjoying each other's company. The more time we spend together like this, the more I want to continue to spend.

In Monaco-ville itself, we spent some time wandering through the Cathedral. The grave of Princess Grace is located here. The Monagans are huge on their fairy-tale princess. Almost everything has her name on it, or shows her influence.

We didn't take the tour of the palace - somehow we passed up the chance to see an old pair of Napoleon's socks - and just drank up the view.

Fiona is now at the spa getting a well deserved treatment. Big day tomorrow - Casino Night!