Things to Do in Monaco With Kids

The Zoological Garden of Monaco is the one animal attraction Monaco lists, and it is closed for the whole of 2026 for cliff-safety and habitat work, with no reopening date set. A family day here still works, because the principality itself is barely 2 square kilometres of walkable, closely policed streets you can cover on foot or on its bus network in an afternoon, with the Oceanographic Museum's shark aquarium picking up the wildlife slack while the zoo rebuilds.

What not to miss

Featured location Zoological Garden of Monaco Monaco, Monaco Prince Rainier III set it up in 1954 on one hectare arranged over four terraces on the Rock. It holds close to 300 animals of some 60 species. No animal was bought: all arrived as gifts, from circuses, as abandoned rescues or through customs seizures.

Prince Rainier III founded the garden in 1954. It occupies one hectare across four levels cut into the Rock of Monaco, above Fontvieille Port, and holds almost 300 animals from about 60 species: exotic birds, tortoises, caimans, a hippopotamus, reptiles, primates and lemurs among them.

For 2026, none of that is visitable. The garden's own statement, reported in January, calls the closure the most ambitious renovation programme since its 1954 creation:

This programme, the most ambitious since our creation 70 years ago, will allow for larger, better-designed spaces focused on animal welfare.

Safety work on the cliff above the site is the reason given for the closure. It has closed before and come back: an agave weevil infestation shut the garden in August 2018, and it reopened in June 2019. No date has been set for this closure, so check before you build a Monaco trip around it.

Other wildlife nearby

With the zoo shut, the Oceanographic Museum's Shark Lagoon is the wildlife stop that still works. Built in 2000, it holds 450,000 litres of seawater at 6 metres deep, recreating an outer coral reef, with blacktip, grey reef, nurse and zebra sharks and a guitar ray. The museum took in one of its hawksbill turtles more than 20 years ago after a customs seizure. It is not a venue this directory lists, so treat it as one stop on a wider Monaco day rather than a replacement for the zoo.

Getting there

Monaco is compact enough to walk end to end, but the Rock's slopes make a bus or the water shuttle worth using with children in tow. CAM, the public operator, runs 11 lines: six regular routes, two night lines and three express lines, plus an electro-solar Bateau-Bus across the harbour and an on-demand Clic Bus minibus service for routes the fixed lines don't cover well.

With kids and accessibility

Once the garden reopens, its own accessibility is a strong point: despite being built into a rocky slope, the visitor route is entirely wheelchair accessible, and there is a children's play area inside the park. Until then, a 2024 report on the principality's policing put its 606-officer force behind 834 recorded incidents that year, ranging from thefts to drink-driving and drug possession, backing up its reputation as one of the safer places to walk with children.