The last 20 miles of French coast before Italy are the most concentrated stretch of glamour and money on the whole Mediterranean. From Nice round the headlands to Menton you pass the deep bay of Villefranche, the green wedge of Cap Ferrat, the towers of Monaco and the gentle bays running up to the frontier at Garavan. It is gorgeous, it is busy, and it is expensive, and as a visiting cruiser you spend half your time deciding whether to pay for a berth or anchor for free with a hundred million euros of superyacht for company. Here is how I read this corner after a few seasons working back and forth along it.
Nice and the start of the run
Nice is the obvious base for the eastern Riviera, and the working marina is Port Lympia, the old harbour below the castle hill. It is central, well-served, and a sensible place to leave the boat while you provision or change crew, though it is not cheap and it gets full. The detail on the harbour itself, the layout and the approaches, is in my piece on Nice and Port Lympia. From here you turn east, and within a couple of miles the coast does its famous trick: it folds up into a series of deep, sheltered bays separated by green headlands, and the cruising suddenly becomes a joy.
Villefranche-sur-Mer
The Rade de Villefranche is, simply, one of the great natural anchorages of the Mediterranean. It is deep, it is sheltered, and it is beautiful, a steep amphitheatre of pastel houses around water that holds some of the largest yachts afloat. The little Darse marina at the head of the bay takes yachts up to about 34 metres, with around 540 moorings and a maximum draught near 4 metres, plus a handful of superyacht berths, but the berths are largely privately held and almost impossible to get in summer. What everyone actually does is anchor in the bay, which is very well sheltered in most conditions and free. The holding is good over sand once you are off the deep central part, and you will share the water with cruise ships and the odd film star, but it remains one of my favourite overnight stops on the entire coast.
Anchoring here, as everywhere on the Riviera now, comes with seagrass rules attached. The protected posidonia meadows are off-limits to anchors, and you are expected to drop on sand. The whole framework is laid out in the posidonia anchoring ban in France and updated year by year in Cote d'Azur anchoring rules for 2026; read one of them before you cruise here, because Villefranche is exactly the kind of busy, watched bay where the rules are enforced.
Cap Ferrat
Round the headland and you reach Cap Ferrat, the wooded peninsula of mansions and gardens that is among the most exclusive scraps of real estate in Europe. The western anchorages, facing back across to Villefranche, are some of the most sheltered on the coast, with pines coming down to clear rocky coves. The marina at Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat has around 580 moorings for yachts up to 30 metres with a maximum draught near 4 metres, but again, getting a visitor berth in season is a long shot. I treat Cap Ferrat as a daytime swim-and-explore stop and anchor back in Villefranche for the night.
Monaco
Then there is Monaco, and there is no understating how it dominates this coast. The Principality's two harbours, Port Hercule and the smaller Port de Fontvieille, are the most prestigious and the most expensive berths in the Mediterranean, geared to the superyacht trade and the Grand Prix rather than to a visiting cruiser on a budget. You can berth there if you have arranged it and you are prepared to pay accordingly, but most of us pass through, gawp at the wall of white hulls, and carry on. Note that Monaco is a separate state, so you are technically leaving and re-entering the EU customs and Schengen area; in practice this is rarely an issue for a yacht passing through, but if you are tracking your Schengen days the rules in my piece on the Schengen 90/180 day rule for boaters are worth knowing. Just east, the small port of Cap d'Ail offers a more realistic berth if you want to be near Monaco without paying Monaco prices.
Menton and the frontier
The run ends at Menton, the warmest town on the French Riviera and the last before Italy. It has two marinas, which is unusual for a place this size. Port de Menton Garavan is the larger and newer, with around 770 berths, of which roughly 170 are public, taking yachts up to about 40 metres and a 3-metre draught. The older Port Municipal, the Vieux-Port below the old town, has around 596 berths with about 100 reserved for visitors, takes vessels up to 30 metres, and quotes a deep maximum draught. Between them you have a far better chance of a visitor berth here than anywhere else on this stretch, which makes Menton a genuinely useful staging post if you are heading for the Italian Riviera and the Ligurian coast beyond.
From Menton it is only a short hop across the border to Ventimiglia and the start of Italy, the natural continuation of this cruise. If Italy is where you are heading, the broader thinking on staging across is in the wider Riviera material; for the run the other way, this leg is the eastern bookend of the classic cruise from Monaco to Saint-Tropez by sea.
Customs, flags and the border
This short coast crosses two frontiers in 20 miles, Monaco in the middle and Italy at the end, and it pays to have your paperwork in order. Monaco is a sovereign state but sits inside the EU customs union and the Schengen area for practical purposes, so a yacht passing through rarely has any formality, though a berth there means following the Principality's own harbour rules. The Italian border at Ventimiglia is a different matter only insofar as your time clock keeps running; both countries are in Schengen, so for non-EU crews the days you spend in France, Monaco and Italy all count against the same 90-in-180 allowance. Carry your boat's registration, insurance and VAT documents, fly the correct courtesy flag for whichever waters you are in, and keep a crew list to hand.
For UK boats in particular this whole region rewards a little homework before you arrive. Since Brexit the formalities around bringing a British-flagged vessel into French and EU waters have changed, and the temporary-admission and customs questions are worth understanding rather than discovering at a fuel berth in Menton. The detail is beyond the scope of a cruising overview, but the broad framework around the time you can stay is the same one I keep pointing to in the Schengen 90/180 day rule for boaters.
Wind, money and timing
The eastern Riviera is sheltered enough that the mistral arrives much weakened, having burned itself out west of here, but you still get strong easterlies and the occasional violent summer thunderstorm rolling off the warm sea, and an easterly puts a swell straight into the open bays. The bigger practical issue is simply cost and crowding. Berths anywhere between Nice and Monaco in July and August are scarce and dear, which is why the free anchorage at Villefranche is worth its weight in gold; the wider picture on what you will pay is in my notes on Cote d'Azur marina fees.
My plan for this coast: base at Nice or Menton, anchor in Villefranche for at least one night, day-trip round Cap Ferrat and past Monaco, and use Menton as your jumping-off point for Italy. Go in June or September. The water is warm, the August superyacht circus has not fully descended or has just left, and you stand a real chance of a berth when you want one. These last French miles are pure theatre, and seen from your own deck rather than the corniche road above, they are worth every careful mile.
