It seems that Port Hercule beginning to fill with more yachts than usual during the first weekend of June can only mean one thing: Monaco’s pulse is about to change. The Principality, which even in these days continues to function as a time capsule straight to the luxurious old money of the nineties, is preparing for its grand annual rite, the Monaco Grand Prix of Formula 1. For a few days, Monte Carlo stops being merely that place where one strolls among legendary hotels and luxury boutiques, to become a living, winding, thunderous, cinematic circuit. In Monaco, Formula 1 is not observed, it is lived and performed even before the engines start to roar. In the grandstands raised along the harbor crowded with boats, in the balconies that seem reserved for a film camera, and in the conversations of those who have come to watch a race but also, inevitably, to be part of a scene.
To experience it, this time I have been able to do so from a truly special perspective. Not from a terrace suspended above an impossible bend with views of the casino, but from the other side of the harbor, aboard Explora I, the flagship cruise ship of Explora Journeys, which docks right in Port Hercule during Grand Prix weekend to offer this unforgettable experience.
The idea, from the outset, has something of a distinctly Monaco-esque fantasy: sleeping at sea, waking up in front of one of the Côte d’Azur’s most iconic postcards, and being able to disembark to participate in the race protocol at any moment. From the moment of arrival in the Principality, everything seems to confirm that this won’t be exactly a cruise, at least not in the traditional sense of the term. Explora Journeys tends to describe its ships as floating hotels, spaces that are not merely a means of transport, but an essential part of the journey, and here the idea fits especially well. During the Grand Prix, the Explora I does not sail; or, better said, it does not sail in the usual way.
