Got up early & hopped on a train to Monaco this morning. Very neat city (er ... country). It's built on the slope of a hill & most of the buildings use the same colour scheme. B/c of the slope of the hill the road map is crazy; lots of long horizontal roads running across the hill & few going up & down it ... which can make it hard to get to somewhere higher up the slope unless you can find the stairwells that give you a shortcut b/w horizontal streets. And people in Monaco definitely have money ... we must have seen every make & model of luxury car in existence drive past us!!! It was neat walking around Monaco too b/c everything is set up for the Formula 1 race to start on Thursday ... so barricades & bleachers are all set up & we saw crews setting up the big trucks that I assume serve as the driver's hangout during the day. We went to teh Musee Oceanographique to visit their aquarium - a big one w/ tons of tanks & some great tropical fish. The aquariums are hilarious too b/c every tank that has a clown fish in it, you hear nearby kids yelling "Nemo, Nemo!!!". Sue - we tried to find the things w/ the lungs again to get a photo for you, but they didn't have them :( We walked around the old city of Monaco which is up on the top of a cliff that juts out into the water (a very swanky neighbourhood as you can well imagine). Passed the Royal Palace, but it was fairly unimpressive looking. Next we visited Prince Rainier III's collection of 100 or so cars (antique, sports, just plain neat....) & 6 old carriages used by the Royal Family 100 years ago. Then we trekked WAY uphill to les Jardins Exotiques - basically a winding path down the hill side that's lined w/ all sort of desert plant species (ie. every different cactus there is). Kinda' neat - but even better was the caves that they take you on a tour through inside the moutain. It was very humid in there (smells like back B.O. inside) & we saw all the stalactyte & stalagmyte formations & stuff - very cool to look at. The rest of the day we just wandered around, checking out boats in the port & of course the famed Monte Carlo casino :) 
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