Our ship does not leave until 9 PM so we have a day to explore the area before boarding later this afternoon. As is our common practice we booked an all day tour with a local person to see the area. I have used “Tours by Locals” on some of our past trips and found a promising tour offered by Pierre, who is obviously a local. (An aside: I also have used the services of “Get your Guide” when booking local tours).

Tour description:  We”ll start this tour with a short visit of the Principality of Monaco, where we’ll see the old town called the Rock, and Monte Carlo, the fancy Casino square. We’ll stop in the charming villages of Eze and La Turbie and as well as the city of Nice, which is the “capital” city of the French Riviera.  We’ll discover as well one of my favorite villages, the last home for the painter Marc Chagall, the village of St Paul de Vence. This is the provencal heart of the French Riviera. And we’ll have spectacular photo stops above Nice, Monaco and Villefranche. We’ll have eventually time to sit for a little lunch somewhere!

Pierre agreed to take us to the ship after our tour.

First surprise of the trip. The Euro value has declined significantly since our last visit. Currently it is valued at 1.05 versus US dollar. It’s a good time to visit Europe!  Our money will go farther while we are here.

We checked out of the hotel before 8:30am and delivered our luggage to the Regent staff located at the hotel (who assured us the luggage would be delivered to our room on the ship), eliminating the need for us to store them while on our local tour. As promised Pierre appeared at the agreed 8:30am pick up time. He spoke excellent English so that eliminated another concern one sometimes runs into-would we be able to understand him.  His vehicle was a large Mercedes which easily accommodated the six of us, and off we went.

Driving along the coastline with constant narration we viewed the Monaco region. The Formula 1 Grand Prix is scheduled to be here in a few weeks so there are grandstands and fencing being erected all along the route of  the race. That race is probably the biggest event held yearly in Monaco.

The Monaco harbor is crowded with the mega yachts of the rich and famous. Pierre rattled off the names of past and current owners of Monaco property- David Niven, Sean Connery, Bono, Elton John are a few of the names I recall him mentioning.There are more billionaires in Monaco than anywhere else in the world. As expected, property values are astronomical here.

We drove to nearby Nice where we parked the vehicle and leisurely strolled through the flower and vegetable market- one of the marvelous activities that is part of daily life in Europe. I could not resist buying a small basket of marvelous strawberries which we shared as we walked with locals doing their daily shopping. Pierre bought us a local, popular snack called “Socca”, a pancake made of chickpeas.

Returning to our van we were driven to Saint-Paul de Vence, a small medieval village of about 3200 people located above Monaco & Nice. We walked through the narrow streets, absorbing the history and attempting to fathom what it might have been like to live there. It is a popular spot for famous people and painters. The town is loaded with small galleries featuring artwork by local artists. Picasso, Jean-Paul Sartre and Ives Montand once visited here.  Painter, Marc Chagall lived and is buried there.

After paying our respects at the grave of Marc Chagall it was time for a leisurely lunch at an outdoor cafe overlooking the valley.  Refreshed, it was time to move on.

The next stop was at the village of La Turbie where we stopped to see the Trophée des Alpes, or Trophy of Augustus, a Roman monument that was built c. 6 BC in honor of Augustus to celebrate his definitive victory over the 45 tribes who populated the region.

Heading back to Monaco we parked the van and did a walking tour that included a visit to the church that contains the burial site of Prince Rainier and his famous American bride, Grace Kelly. We also viewed the royal palace, which is not all that impressive compared to other palaces in the world.

By this time we were eager to get to the ship and in a few moments we were boarding our home for the next two weeks. By arriving so late in the day (5PM) we avoided the usual mob of other arriving passengers. There were no people or lines so we walked right onto the ship after passing security and providing our health data to the staff.  When we arrived at our rooms we found our luggage had safely been delivered so all was well!

Fellow traveler, Ron Massa, had been on this ship last fall so he was our official tour guide to show us the ins & outs of the beautiful new ship (launched 2020-not the best timing!). The ship is modern, glitzy and is of modest size, holding a maximum of 750 passengers (the same as most of the Regent fleet). I was told there would be about 525 passengers on our cruise.

We quickly unpacked in our HUGE cabins with so much storage space we joked we might not be above to remember where we have stored items. As on other Regent ships the is a large walk in closet, a massive bathroom with dual sinks, tub and separate shower.

 

We barely had enough time to unpack before it was time for our first official cocktail hour and dinner in the signature Compass Rose Dining room. We are on our way!