Vatican Museums & [Day] Trip to Amalfi!

July 24 - 26th

After such a long weekend, it was back to [reality] in Rome. Well, as much as living in Rome can be reality. We had three days of class before our next three-day weekend, and we began to get into our final project for our studio class. As a break from the tedium of our normal classes (and coming up with building design after building design) we took our final contemporary architecture field trip with architect Luigi.

Left: The Lateran Library (obviously a new building) addition to the Laterano complex of buildings, a sort of school for monks (next to San Giovanni in Laterano). It has a regular stack library, but the reading room is a system of ramps with desks on the ramps. The slanting windows on the facade correspond with the ramps.




Left: Inside the library reading room, looking up at the ramps. The railings of each floor were just solid pieces of glass, and let's just say that when I made it to the top floor, I was a bit freaked out. I had to sit down for a bit at one of the desks before I could head back down.








After the Library, we took a bus to the Macro museum, where they are adding an addition. It is actually in the middle of construction, so it was interesting to see it in its incomplete state. We also got a tour with the project architect, who told us all about the space. However, he only knew Italian, so we only got the translated version from our guide Luigi. The interior of the building was an open space, open to the public, with galleries off the sides. Also, the roof is a public space, except for the large glass skylight over the central atrium, which will have water running over it to keep it cool.

Left: View of one of the gallery spaces, with its notable catwalks. Because of them, you will be able to view the art at ground level and from above. I look forward to visiting this space when I return to Rome in the future.


As we approached another weekend, we made big plans for how to spend our three-day break from classes, but with only a three-day week, we had limited time. Also, as we met our half-way point in the term, we realized that our time in Rome was limited, and there was still much to see in this Eternal City.

So we decided to stay in Rome for at least Friday, to visit more of Rome's more time-consuming spots. After a late night visiting one of the clubs in Rome, we took the morning easy, then headed to the Vatican Museum in the afternoon (the best time to visit the museum is weekday afternoons). It was amazing!

Left: The surprisingly contemporary entry to the Vatican museum.









The first room we went into was a library of first edition Bibles, in many languages. They were beautifully illustrated, and some of them were HUGE! It wasn't until the very end that I found an English Bible, and it was a small little thing.

Left: a first edition Bible illustration page... I can't remember which language... Latin?






After the Bible gallery, we entered into the Pinacoteca, the main picture gallery, which included a few Caravaggios, Raphaels, etc, etc, etc. I was surprised that photography was allowed in every room of the Museum (except the Sistine Chapel - drat!) just without the flash.

Left: The Transfiguration by Raphael, in the largest room of the picture gallery. This was one of the darkest rooms, so you know that there must be important works in there. Not to mention the large crowds of people gathered around it.








I had been told about the Raphael Rooms in the Vatican, that they were perhaps better than the Sistine Chapel. I knew that they were at the end of the Museum, but when I came to them, I wasn't sure it was them or not, but then I saw...

Left: Raphael's School of Athens, on the upper part of the wall in the third Raphael Room. It is a painting of people in his time: philosophers, painters, scientists, etc. A funny story: he was painting this the same time as Michelangelo painting, and he went and saw what he was doing a few rooms down, and then went and added him to his painting. (Front and center, in the purple).

So after winding a bit through the museum's modern art gallery, we ascended the stairs into the Sistine Chapel, at the very end of the Vatican Museum. Luckily, we came in pretty late in the afternoon, and during the time we were there, it really thinned out, and I actually sat on one of the benches that line the edge for a while.

Left: Sistine Ceiling center. Although pictures are not technically allowed inside, there were tons of other people taking pictures, and no one said anything, so I took a few, but then the reinforcement came in... and the camera went away.

So after a lot of debate, I decided to head to the Amalfi Coast for the weekend. Two of my roommates were going, and I originally wanted to head to the northern coasts, but the train was a bit more expensive, and long. So we set out for Altrani, a sea town just a few hundred feet from Amalfi, early Saturday morning. I planned on just staying until Sunday morning, but transportation always takes longer than expected...

Left: View from our train on the way to Salerno. It randomly stopped on the tracks in the middle of nowhere, so we were checking out what was going on. (We never figured it out) It was a long day of travel. After our delayed train, we missed our ferry to Amalfi, so instead we took a bus along the VERY windy road, that took over an hour. The bus had to honk its horn around every corner, I was a bit frightened.


So we finally made it to our destination, Altrani, and found our hostel (Altrani is not very big) right as the office was closing.  But the management was really nice, even if the room was not.  It was nice, but small, and the walls didn't go all the way to the ceiling, so we could hear everything our neighbors were saying.  Also, the shower in the bathroom was interesting, because there was no shower, just a showerhead on the wall, so the water went everywhere!  But I couldn't complain, because...

Left: The view from our hostel was amazing!  (Not from our room - because it had no windows - but from the entrance).  Also, we were about a four minute walk to the beach through these winding stairs, so... no complaints here.




Step one of our amazing beach trip: lay on the beach.  It was late-afternoon by this point, so the sun wasn't at its strongest, but I still preferred laying under a big umbrella, with a good book (the Twilight series, if you're curious).

Left: View from my lounge chair, wasting away the afternoon.  All the beaches along the Amalfi coast are built into the valley between the cliffs.  Altrani is an especially small one, but very picturesque!  On top of the large arches is the road that we took into town, so you can see how ocean-front it really is.  We didn't spend too much time in the water because it was cooling off, but it was so much different than the other beaches we had been to.  This coastline is sort of protected by a cove, so there are less strong waves, making it more like a lake.  It did make it easier to swim in, though, because you didn't have as much up-and-down movement.    

Left: More overall view of Altrani, as we are walking towards Amalfi.  The beach is basically one private beach (where we got 2 umbrellas & 3 lounges for 15 euro) and one public beach.  You can see how the building are built right next to (and into) the long arcade, which appears to be pretty old.  Then, towering over the whole town, is this large cliff that appears to be one large boulder or something. 

After our beach day, we headed to Amalfi for a little exploration & for dinner.  (We got pizza in Altrani for lunch, and the guy just let us take our glass plates right out on the beach - it was lovely).  We found out that the Amalfi coast is well-known for its limoncello (lemon vodka) and ceramics.  We went to this one Limoncello store, and the shopkeeper was giving free samples.  He was very confused why I wouldn't take one.  He kept saying, "but it's free!"  He did recommend a good place for dinner, though.

Left: At the center of the town is the Amalfi Cathedral, and in typical Italian fashion, we came upon a wedding!  They were taking their photos along the grand staircase.  The cathedral was closed, so we planned to stop here tomorrow.  Amalfi architecture is much more strongly decorated than that in Rome, including one ceramic dome that is supposed to resemble a yellow lemon.

The next morning, we set out for Amalfi in the morning, so that our afternoon could be more flexible.  The Cathedral was nice, of course, but next to it was the courtyard, which is laid out as a typical paradise garden.  It has a collonade around it, a small water feature at the center, and it is laid out in a four-square pattern (like the four rivers of the Garden of Eden).

Left: The Cathedral courtyard.  I really liked the pattern that the arches made on the walls.  I tried to sketch it later from a photo, and it was quite difficult!  You can walk all around the collonade, but there are only two small entrances into the central garden area, which we thought looked like a tropical paradise - fit for a paradise garden.




After another lazy afternoon on our favorite Altrani beach, we left from Amalfi, this time in a ferry from the dock (no more winding roads on a honking bus for us!).  We were all a little sun-kissed from our beach weekend, but we still sat on the top deck of the ferry to get god views of this beautiful coastline.

Left: View towards Amalfi as we departed from our ferry.  You can see the dramatic cliffs behind the town, and the predominately-white architecture.  The main tower in the center is the bell tower for the cathedral.  

So, long story short, we took our ferry to Salerno, where we planned on catching a 5:30 train back to Rome (to be home before 9:00).  We were all worried about the ferry taking too long, but we got to the station by 5:00.  However, our train (and almost all other trains in the station) kept getting more and more delayed, to the point where the station was full of people waiting.  They kept giving announcements in English & Italian, but the Italian announcements were much more descriptive, so we suspect they may have been giving a reason for the delay.  In the end, we left the station at about 9:30 pm, to get home at a fun 1:00 in the morning.  It was a relaxing yet exhausting weekend, not quite the best prep for a busy week ahead!