Naples/Caserta - Palace of Caserta - Gardens

One of the features of the park that I think is fantastic beyond all that is fantastic is the 3 km long “pond” with a 70 foot tall cascade at the end of it. After the cramped quarters of the Centro Historico in Naples, the open English style park with its great wazzok of a “pond” is rather nice. As with the palace itself the impression is one of overwhelming size, quantity rather than quality. This is sad because there are actually some really amazing sculptures here, they just get a little lost in the sheer vastness of it all.

To walk around the pond/canal it takes about an hour with stopping at each fountain and terrace for a good look and photo op. I would recommend taking an umbrella if it is drizzling or raining. The ornamental trees provide little protection from the elements.



There are tons of sculptures, mostly in collected groups: the arts, the sciences, personifications of architecture, geography etc. and urns supported by tritons and putti. I bet in the summer it must be delightful, but around about New Year’s it’s a little depressing, especially with the drizzle and fog.  The sheer size makes up for it though, damned impressive.

Every quarter kilometer or so one comes to a new fountain and or terrace. Each with it's own theme and dripping with ornament and sculpture.

First up is the fountain of dolphins.  They are sort of proto-evolution dolphins as they have claws and are actually rather terrifying. If marvelously sculpted in a grotesquely fantastic way. 

Can't sleep the dolphins will eat me! 

Next up is the Fountain of Aeolus. Here is a sort of grotto with several dozen zephyrs spouting water jets.

Fountain of Aeolus. I'd love to get in that artificial grotto, it looks cool! 

After the fountain of Aeolus comes the Fountain of Ceres.  I think she is holding a medallion of Persephone? 

Ceres, being all fountain like. 

The palace gets further and further away.

It's gonna be a long walk back. 

The fountain of Venus and Adonis is next. 

Not entirely sure what is going on in this sculpture but it looks darn sexy.

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Finally the statue of Diana and Actaeon, the unfortunate peeping Tom.  For his crime of catching the goddess Diana in the nude he was turned into a stag and torn apart by hunting dogs. Nice! Give me that old time religion. The cascade leads from a grotto about 200 feet above the fountain.

Fountain of Diana and Actaeon. 

Someone liked to sculpt dogs methinks. Here's Actaeon getting torn apart:

And here's Diana with all her bathing attendants. It suddenly all becomes clear:

One last look at the cascade from close up and back to the palace. During the summer there are acres of garden to explore.

Naples /Caserta - Palace of Caserta

Caserta, Front Facade 

If you have a half day to spare and have already visited Herculaneum I would recommend heading out to the Palace of Caserta.

Trains leave Napoli Centrale in Piazza Garibaldi about every 10-20 minutes. It’s a fairly easy ride on a commuter train. Tried to take a bus, but was repeatedly mauled by ancient gypsy woman while trying to read the timetable, so went with the train.

The train drops off as Caserta’s railway station in, can you guess? Piazza Giuseppe Garibaldi in Caserta. As you exit the station the palace is right there in front of you being big and palace-like. I am not kidding about the big, at 1,200 rooms it is one of the largest palaces in Europe.

Started in the 1750’s Caserta, when the Bourbon monarchy was ruling Naples, it was designed with the massive palace of Versailles in mind. However, Caserta was finished in less than thirty years whereas Construction on Versailles continued for 120 years and never reached full completion. Like the Royal Palace in Naples it was built as a symbol of power and as a sort of tribute to the idea of monarchy. Somewhat like the Escorial in Spain, Caserta was meant to be more than just a palace. It was also to contain a military barracks and a university, skipping the monastery included in the Escorial’s plan. I get the impression that Carlo de Bourbon really just liked huge buildings. The palace of the poor in Naples was built at the same time (see: Albergo dei Poverei).

In April 1945 the palace was the site of the signing of terms of the unconditional German surrender of forces in Italy. The agreement covered between 600,000 and 900,000 soldiers along the Italian Front including troops in sections of Austria. It was also used in the tragic Star Wars Episodes I and II and served as the Vatican in a number of better movies.

Rear, Center Facade

One of four courtyard

Naples - December 31, 2011 - Albergo Dei Poveri

We were thwarted on our attempt to go to the Palace of Caserta by the Italian train system, but no matter, I had built in fail-safes for this very eventuality. Our first stop that day was the Albergo dei Poveri a poor/work house begun by King Charles II (Bourbon) in 1749, while he was actually building the Palace of Caserta.

The walk from the train station took about twenty minutes and passed through not the best neighborhoods of Naples. Each street and piazza had it's own charm or character. The area closer to the Albergo and further from the Centro Direzionale and Centro Historico had a little more character than might normally be desired. In fact if it were a character in a movie (say circa 1920) it would have been hiding behind a tree twiddling it's mustache waiting to tie Mary Pickford to the train tracks.  Believe me I know that I am very privileged to be able to visit Naples and I can't complain, but I have never seen that much canine fecal matter on a single stretch sidewalk, ever, not even in Paris. I eventually stopped looking at the sidewalk realizing that stepping in some was inevitable.

The Albergo dei Poveri (also known as the Bourbon Hospice for the Poor) immediately impresses with its tremendous size and brilliant whiteness.  The thing that impresses the most is that only one side of the building was actually built. The original plans called for a gigantic building with five courtyards, a chapel and a facade of 1,900 feet (about 600 meters). As it is the building stretches for 1,000 feet down the Via Foria with its large portal and pediment centered on the Piazza Carlos II. Which is not a delightful square, but is very much part of Naples as lived in by Neopolitans.  There was a little hole in the wall market, a couple of cafes and a bar or two, plus plenty of palm trees.

The building has been restored in recent years and is now used for various exhibitions (most recently Gunther von Hagens Body Worlds. I saw his Body World & The Brain in Portland, Oregon earlier this year, still not sure, I thought it was a little "artistic" and working in a medical university I was expecting something a little more clinical.). 

Albergo dei Poveri looking North along the Via Fiori. The Orange letters are the sign for the Napoli Teatro Festival Italia
Yes it is supposed to look like that...

The most awesome building ever! On the VIa Fiori and Piazza Carlos II across the street from the Albergo dei Poveri