By 0300 this morning, the wind had picked up to 9 10 knots on our beam. The waves picked up, too, of course. It still was not a bad ride. Despite it being wavier, our speed increased, and we were flying along at 6.5 knots with only 1600 RPM. We had a current with us.

By 0800, we could clearly see Monaco in the distance. It is a cluster of tall and midrange buildings, which start along the shore and creep up the green mountain. But the major development only seems to go part way up the mountain — there is almost a clear line where it changes to a scattering of small buildings. That must be the northern border of France. The top of the mountain was covered by a cloud, so we couldn’t tell what was near the top.

Off to the right, in France, it is mostly smaller buildings, both along the coast and creeping up the hill. To the left, also in France, the tall buildings creep down the coast, but above the shoreline there are a few smaller buildings and not much more.

We approached the Hercules Harbor entrance. We imagined how the call on the radio would go. “Do you have any spots available?” Eric would ask.
“What size is your boat?”
“13 meters”
“Wait, are you the fishing boat out there? No, we don’t accept fishing boats in Monaco waters. Only sleek, sexy and expensive yachts.”
“But we’re not a fishing boat. We’re a Nordhavn. Nordhavn is a high end brand name.”
“One moment” We hear the radio operator whisper in French, then hear a background voice say “c’est possible si le bateau”¦ (undecipherable words)”¦ acceptable”. Then the radio operator comes back to us and says “Is your boat worth a minimum of seven figures in Euros?”
“Uh, not quite, but you know the American dollar has really devalued lately”
“I’m sorry, your boat isn’t high enough value to enter Monaco’s waters”.

OK, maybe we are exaggerating our expectations of Monaco’s snobbishness just a little. This is how the call really went: Eric called on the radio to the marina and asked if they had a spot. They immediately said they had no space available at all. We imagine in a place like Monaco, the marinas are the same as expensive restaurants. All you have to do is mention how rich and powerful you are, and suddenly a table materializes when three seconds before there wasn’t one available all night. Of course, we couldn’t play the rich and powerful card, so Eric tried a different approach.
“We’re really small, only 13 meters” he begged. Still a firm no.
“OK, where do you recommend we go to?” Eric asked.
The woman replied “What is your size again?”
Eric repeated and she said with resignation “We do have one spot with no water or electricity.” To which Eric replied excitedly “We’ll take it!”

We were shocked that it was so easy to get a spot. Not even a single screening question about the flash factor of our boat. We don’t care about the power. More often than not, when power is available we don’t bother to plug in, anyway. The water is more of a concern, especially because we were going to be having guests on board. But, as long as we shower at the marina and use the marina toilets at least half the time, we should have enough water to last us the week. We were actually looking forward to showering at this marina. We figured it would at least be as nice as Malta, and probably as nice as the fancy club showers in Singapore. Hell, given Monaco’s reputation, we were half expecting solid marble walls and floors with gold plated plumbing fixtures in the yachtie facilities.

We proceeded forward and were met by a guide dinghy seconds later. We passed dozens, and we are not exaggerating one bit, dozens of gigantic and super fancy mega yachts. We passed so many that we started to worry again about being kicked out for not being expensive enough. But, to our relief, as we neared the sea wall, there were a couple whole finger docks full of normal looking boats. We were led to the west corner of the sea wall and side tied right onto the main boardwalk. Oddly enough, we were the only boat on the sea wall, and it was immediately apparent we weren’t in a real parking space at all. It really was an overflow space, and to give full credit, from what we could tell, the marina looked to be totally full. Overflow or not, from what we could tell, we had the very best spot in the entire marina. We were literally just a few steps from the center of town. Wow.

As we got situated, we noticed there was a lot of pedestrian traffic, with lots of people stopping to stare at Kosmos, some even peeking in the windows. And she still isn’t properly put back together since the flood, so having so many people looking inside was a bit embarrassing.

Eric went to the harbor master and checked in with the marina. He got the sense this is the kind of place where the right hand has no clue what the left is doing. The he went to maritime police and checked in. All they required was one form to be filled out, totally straightforward and easy. Within a half hour we were done with check in formalities.

The bad news is that there are no marina facilities. There is a generic public restroom very close to the boat. If we want a shower, we are more than welcome to pay the regular fees to use the public pool in the middle of the boardwalk along the waterfront. The pool has attached shower facilities. We knew the slip here would be expensive. It is $65 USD per night which wouldn’t be too bad by European standards if it weren’t off season with no electricity, water or yachtie facilities. But to us, the amazing parking spot is worth the fee.

As soon as we were checked in, it was time to go for our celebratory meal out at a local restaurant. Back in America, Christi had never been into makeup/hair/fashion. She did the bare minimum to appear socially acceptable. She had been all too happy to give those things up as part of our new cruising lifestyle. Nowadays, it takes Christi 20 minutes to shower and be out the door, the same amount of time it takes Eric. But today is different. We are in the playground of the rich and famous, and some effort at decorum must be made or else they may kick us out for being too shabby. Out came the makeup, styling products, and accessories. She was worried she wouldn’t remember how to use the various products, but it was kind of like riding a bike. After digging through her long abandoned boxes of products, she went to work. An hour and a half later, she was finally ready to go. When Eric saw her he asked “where is my wife?” She even went so far as to trade out her practical backpack for a dainty little purse.

We wandered up and down the boardwalk, checking out the dozen or so restaurants. We were tempted by the American sports bar featuring a menu almost identical to TGIFriday’s, but we decided on one that looked even more cool. It is essentially an art gallery, and there are traveling art exhibits on display all throughout the restaurant, both inside and out. The art was interesting and appealing.

The food was French. Eric ordered a triple artichoke appetizer that came with artichoke raviolis, artichokes marinated in olive oil, and artichoke salad with a little greens, a lot of parmesan pieces, and a tasty dressing. Christi ordered the soup. It was different. It was an incredibly rich cream and goat cheese soup, served lukewarm, with a soft boiled egg and a couple pieces of fried parma ham floating in it. The texture of the ham was more like American bacon than the normally uncooked and delicate parma ham. For our main course, Eric got a green salad served with crab salad, whole shrimp, pineapple, grapefruit, avocado and watermelon. We don’t think we have ever seen that combination of foods before. Here is a photo of it.

Christi got a hearty stew with gnocchi as the starch instead of plain potatoes. There were bones in the stew meat. For dessert we got a fig tart. It was a shortbread crust covered with what we think is some sort of nut butter, and topped with pieces of figs. The figs were really tasty, the jury is still undecided on the nut butter. If that is even what it was.

Normally, after our celebratory meal, Eric wants to stay in the boat and relax, and Christi is usually is desperate to go site seeing. Today Christi decided she wanted to stay on board and relax. She has a mild cold and wasn’t up for going out. This made Eric worry that something may be seriously wrong with her, especially when she had spent so much time getting ready.

While we were relaxing aboard, we heard a noise that made us poke our head out the door. We were most surprised to see that they were vacuuming the water in the bay! No joke, this little contraption actually filters the trash out of the water. This is in line with our image of Monaco as being immaculately clean.

And here is our view of the Palace from Kosmos. According to the map, it looks like it is on the rock almost directly above us. It looks like it is straight out of a fairy tale.

In the mid-afternoon, Eric wandered over to the fuel dock to look for top of the line oil. So far, the only place in the world we have seen this particular grade oil is in Australia (and America, of course). They had it here! Yay! No more settling for medium grade oils, we were going with the best!

The wind picked up slowly as the day went on. We really timed our arrival well. Conditions are probably not very good out there anymore.