The Ponte Vecchio, or ‘Old Bridge’, is a mediaeval bridge across the River Arno in Florence. The existing bridge dates from 1345, although there were bridges at this location as far back as Roman times. It is of course, one of the most famous sights in the world, and huge numbers of tourists from around the world visit this bridge every year. It is a thing of beauty, both in terms of its elegant structure and its beautiful colours.

The small shops which hang off the sides of the bridge are painted in attractive pastel colours.

Originally, there were a variety of different shops, including butchers, fish mongers and tanners of hides; all practices where I imagine it was a convenient location to throw things into the river! Today, and since 1593 incredibly enough, there are only jewelery shops on the bridge. They did not seem to be doing much trade, although everybody was looking! Maybe one in a thousand buy something?

There were also street vendors – immigrants from north Africa – selling their wares on the bridge. They either sold sticks for taking selfies, or – it seemed to me – rather poor reproductions of paintings (below). They played a continual game of cat and mouse with the local police, scooping up their wares and hurriedly moving on when the blue-coated police arrived.

The local municipal police (polizia municipale) – in the white custodian helmets – seemed to me to be doing a good job, but were a lot less intimidating than the Carabinieri, who were usually tall young men in sun glasses!

We all want to visit famous places and see them for ourselves. Once we have done that we can tell our friends, post blogs on the Internet and share pictures on Facebook, Instagram or wherever. Unless one is completely elitist, this has to be a good thing, but with well over 7 billion people on the planet, it means that some places are going to get quite crowded. That said, I did not find the bridge unduly crowded when I visited in March, but I guess it does get very busy in the summer. Florence is also a fairly big city, so apart from the main sites (Ponte Vecchio, the Duomo etc.), it is not too difficult to sidestep the crowds if you visit out of season. I did not take a selfie (on purpose) but I am glad a went and saw this iconic structure for myself. I would however, have loved to have seen it in Medieval times, with all the hustle and bustle of a functioning market.

I noticed a large number of padlocks attached to some iron railings on the bridge and wondered what these were.  Apparently, there is a superstition that if you and your loved one attach a padlock to somewhere on the bridge, and then throw  the key into the river, your love will last forever. Quite a nice sentiment, although as a result of the large number of people who now want to do this, there is now a €160 penalty for anyone caught attaching a lock! Maybe its better just to make a wish?