Two countries, one principality, and a medieval village perched on a mountainside!

What a day! Do I keep saying that? We started with breakfast on the terrace with an incredible view. Still in sight was our "pirate ship" which no was joined by a large yacht. When the yacht first pulled up I thought it was going to attack the pirate ship. I think I had too many pirate dreams last night about Johnny Depp.

After breakfast we drove to Eze. It's a medieval village perched on a hillside. A tourist attraction but totally cool. My photos won't do it justice. While Werner waited in a cafe below we climbed steps that wound through the village, shops were tucked into lots of little nooks and cranies. It also looked like people lived there too. Towards the top they had built an "exotic garden" of cactus and succulents at 1300 ft. above the sea was the remains of an old castle.

I think you can click on this map to see the how the gardens were made to go up the mountain.

There were beautiful sculptures interspersed in the gardens and the views were amazing. Here's one more shot of the ruins at the top.

As you can see, we had perfect weather. After we climbed down we drove on to Monaco. The drive was phenomenal. Monaco was crowded with people and the preparations for the Grand Prix auto race. We didn't go into the Monte Carlo casino but I wanted to take a photo for my step-dad, Bob. Then we toured the grounds and looked at some more yachts. Below are a few photos. If you click on the photo on the right you can see the viewing stands. There were chain link fences lining all the roads to keep the cars from flying into the crowds.

After we left Monaco we decided to drive into Italy. We stopped at a little beach community for a step into the sea and an ice cream cone. The beach rather than having sand was covered with what looked like river rocks. They were awful to walk on barefoot but the sound they made when a wave ebbed was absolutely musical!

We made our way back to our hotel through a little, very untouristy village, La Turbie, recommended by none other than my new best friend, Rick Steves, and had dinner in what he described as the "most welcoming restaurant on the Riviera." It was! I'll conclude with a photo of some Roman ruins in La Turbie and the end of another fabulous day!