Trip to Monaco- Friday

Friday: We left early Friday morning at 6:45 from the nearby train station in Riva. The trip got off to a semi-rocky start when two of the boys mixed 6:45 and 7:45 and missed the train (from which we all had to be together to get the group rate ticket we bought). We rode to Milan, Italy and then transferred to another train to Ventimiglia, Italy, a small town on the border of France. That train took 4 hours but luckily we had a compartment train where all of us could spread out and sleep most of the way. When we got to Ventimiglia, we transferred one last time to a regional train and rode into Nice, France. We finally got to our hostel around 4pm (yea…a LONG day of traveling) and my group of 5 girls got ready to go to the International du Cirque in Monte Carlo!!! We got there about an hour before it started because they had all the animals outside for people to look at. There were cages of lions and horses and a tank for seals! It was sooo cool to see them up close like that with only a little cage in between – that would never happen in the states! We also spent our time eating crepe and cotton candy in preparation for the show!!

Once we got in, we realized why our tickets were the last ones to get sold/were so cheap. We were in the back with a big light structure in front of us haha BUT, luckily the next section was not filled up so we moved once the circus started. We found out later that section was reserved for the performers who wanted to watch the show after they did their part! By the end of the show we were sitting with dancers and trapeze artists! The show was really neat. I was expecting more of a Cirque de Soleil type show but it was really just like a traditional Ringling Brother’s & Barnem and Baileys but different acts worldwide compete to be featured in the show. Some of my favorites were the elephants, an act with seals (which I have never seen before), and a crazy Russian trapeze act.

We had to leave about 15 min early in order to catch the last bus back to Nice (about 30 min from Monte Carlo) and started our treck home…which really took forever! We were quite cold and outside waiting for trams/shuttles etc. but finally made it back around 2. It was stressful trying to navigate a place I have never been before, but we were successful so maybe we should give ourselves more credit! (Monte Carlo/Nice SATURDAY Continued on Next post)