The F1 in Monaco

Monaco, the Las Vegas of Europe, is known for being made up primarily (84%, according to a very credible source) of wealthy people. It’s the kind of place that has its cab drivers riding in Mercedes:

So naturally, you can understand why I couldn’t resist stopping by for a day when I was only 20 km away! I ended up playing the major tourist when I backpacked through it with some Canadian girls and my buddy, Jake:

I think it would also be appropriate to mention that Monaco is built on a string of mountains:

Imagine our surprise when we were told we’d be seeing Monaco during one of its F1 weekends! We were all pretty much ecstatic! Of course, we couldn’t afford to pay to go see anything, but it would be cool to see what kinds of festivities would be going on.

As we were walking down the hill to the racetrack from the train station, we walked past a Ferrari dealership:

We get to the ticketbooths for the races to compare prices and we decide that we can’t really afford to go in. That’s around the moment a stranger walked up to us and gave us a pair of tickets:

Yea, that’s right. We got in for free. Here’s what it was like:

It’s pretty cool. At the time of day we were there, the drivers were having fun driving vintage cars from the 1950s and 1960s. There are several announcers and they take turns explaining the play-by-plays in different languages (English, French, Spanish, Italian, German…)

People who didn’t get tickets climbed up beside the castle in Monaco:  and looked over from the top of the mountain:

Of course, we didn’t have to.

Hey, check out the weird tomatoes they have in the South of France!

I spent the rest of the day taking hour long train rides and visiting a handful of cities, but since those were in Italy, I’m saving them for the next post.