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Routes

2 hour express

The essentials, from Palace to Casino.

Distance
2.9 km
Walking
42 min on foot
With visits
about 4 h 30
Stops
6
Prince's Palace1Monaco Cathedral2Oceanographic Museum3Port Hercule4Monte-Carlo Casino5Casino Gardens6
Map : © OpenStreetMap contributors, tuiles OpenFreeMap

Stops

  1. Prince’s Palace

    Here stands the Prince’s Palace, the beating heart of the Rock. The story begins in 1191, when Genoa acquired this headland and built a fortress to watch over the coast. On the night of 8 January 1297, so the tradition goes, François Grimaldi, nicknamed Malizia, the cunning one, knocked at the gate disguised as a Franciscan monk.

    200 m to the next stop

  2. Monaco Cathedral

    This dazzling white facade belongs to the Cathedral of Our Lady Immaculate. It looks old, yet it is fairly young: built between 1875 and 1903 in a Romanesque Byzantine style, with white stone quarried at La Turbie, up in the hills. It replaced a thirteenth century parish church dedicated to Saint Nicholas, and some of its treasures were kept.

    370 m to the next stop

  3. Oceanographic Museum

    Clinging to the cliff, eighty five metres above the waves, this stone palace is devoted to the sea. It was the dream of Prince Albert I, known as the scientist prince. Passionate about oceanography, he led dozens of expeditions aboard his yachts, hauling unknown creatures up from the deep.

    1.2 km to the next stop

  4. Port Hercule

    This is Port Hercule, a natural jewel box between the Rock and Monte Carlo. Its name comes from an ancient legend: the hero Hercules is said to have passed this way, and the Greeks and then the Romans called the anchorage Portus Herculis Monoeci. For centuries it was just an open bay exposed to storms.

    1.0 km to the next stop

  5. Monte-Carlo Casino

    Here is Monte Carlo’s most famous landmark. In the mid nineteenth century Monaco was poor: Menton and Roquebrune, its main sources of income, had broken away. Prince Charles III then bet on gambling and sea bathing.

    120 m to the next stop

  6. Casino Gardens

    In front of the Casino stretch gardens as neat as a painting: gently sloping lawns, palm trees, flower beds and pools reflecting the facade. Locals sometimes call them the Boulingrins, a word borrowed from the English bowling green, the kind of lawn fashionable in the nineteenth century. The gardens were laid out when Monte Carlo was born, to give visitors an elegant stroll before entering the Casino.