CASERTA & CASSINO

Full day guided tour to admire the Royal Palace of Caserta. In his memoirs, the architect Vanvitelli says it was the king who designed the Royal Palace. This may have been adulation, or perhaps Charles III knew what he wanted, to emulate his favourite models, the Buen Retiro in Madrid and Versailles in France. Vanvitelli drew inspiration from the former for this quadrangular 1,200 – room structure, which was finally completed in 1852.

After visiting this spectacular Palace, and some of its Lush rooms, we then take you to the Hill top town of Cassino, and to the abbey of Monte Cassino, perhaps the most famous monastery in the world, it stands on a hill some 400m above the town of Cassino. The abbey was founded by St Benedict of Norcia in 529 after he had left Subiaco guided by three tame ravens. Rebuilt to its actual splendour, as it was destroyed several times throughout its history, and the tragedy of 15th February 1944 when the abbey was bombed by the Allies, was the fifth time.