The Howrah Bridge spans the Hooghly River in Kolkata, a familiar sight for commuters and locals. Its cantilever structure, built in 1943, supports daily traffic without using any nuts or bolts, an astonishing engineering accomplishment. This somewhat cliched angle is from the Mullick Ghat Flower Market, which I’ll post about later.
The Passerelle Simone de Beauvoir looks like a giant streamer was thrown across the Seine river in Paris. It’s a pedestrian-only bridge (cyclists are allowed). It has an interesting story in that it was constructed in Alsac and taken to Paris on barges. The actual assembly in Paris only took 2 hours! It was constructed by the Eiffel company, as in the famous tower, but over 100 years later in 2006.
Pegasus Bridge is a is a bascule bridge (which means it lifts up to allow river traffic through. It was one of the key access points that had to be secured in the D-Day landings, and one of the few places that had an almost text-book capture of the bridge. Although it’s also the site of the first allied casualty in the D-Day landings.
In 1994, when the road was widened, they replaced it with a wider version of the original bridge, which was moved to a museum alongside the canal.
Looking down towards the bridge towards the mechanism
The original bridge, in the Pegasus Bridge Museum. The museum has some interesting exhibits, including a full-scale glider replica, as well as parts of an original glider.
The Szabadság Bridge, from the castle gardens
The The Erzsébet Bridge, also, from the castle gardens.
For me a trip isn’t complete without exploring the bridges. And since Budapest is literally two cities spanning the Danube River, it has some wonderful bridges. The Szabadság Bridge, which was built in the 19th century, is a blend of elegance and history. Ornate design, guardian lion statues, and city vistas make crossing it a visual treat. The road is completely separate from the pedestrian pavement, so it is surprisingly peaceful to run across.
The Erzsébet Bridge, built in the 1960’s is far more modern (and busy). The functional design still has some lovely lines though, and its quite astonishing how thick those cables are when you get up close.
A nice route to run is to cross the Erzsébet Bridge towards Buda (the castle), climb the stairs and run around the castle gardens, then head back to the river on the Northern side of the castle, and run back to Pest along the Szabadság Bridge.
A view across the Danube river, you can just make out the corner of Bratislava Castle on the left.
Here is another view of the river, this time from the Castle walls. The strange building is the “UFO”, a restaurant and observation deck.
Because Wroclaw is dissected by a major river with many small islands in the middle, it is a city of bridges. When I went for a run, I tried to cross as many bridges as possible. I think I managed 18 bridge crossings on a 10k run. Here are just a few of the many bridges.
I was standing in Gorlitz, the eastern-most town in Germany. Looking across the bridge you see the town of Zgorzelec, the western-most town in Poland. It was a simple matter to pop across to Poland for lunch. Well it would have been if the restaurant we wanted to visit wasn’t full.
We found this old Roman footbridge on one of our many side-journeys while driving around the Peloponnese in Greece. It’s called the Arkadiko Bridge, and was built in Mycenaean times, approx 1300 BC. That’s over 3300 years ago, and it’s still standing (there are 4 such-brides in the Peloponnese. It is also one of the oldest arch bridges in the world, and is still in use! I wonder if the bridge-builders though that over 3000 years layer there would still be traffic over it.
The Pont d’Avignon (Pont St-Bénezet), built between 1171 and 1185, is a famous medieval bridge in Avignon. It originally crossed the Rhone between Avignon and Villeneuve-les-Avignon. The original span is 900m, however over the years it suffered much damage due to floods. In 1668 it was finally abandoned, and now only four of the original 22 arches remain. You can still walk to the end of the bridge, where it dramatically stops in the middle of the river.
The name Saint Bénézet comes from, a local shepherd boy who was commanded by angels to build a bridge across the river. There is now a small chapel on the bridge, where he has been interred. I found the chapel a refreshing and cool break after the heat of the sun on the top of the bridge.
The bridge was very commercially important, since it was the only way to cross the river between Lyon and the Mediterranean Sea. This of course resolted in the merchants using it to transport their goods.
The well-known song "Sur le pont d’Avignon" (On the bridge of Avignon) speaks about people dancing on the bridge of Avignon. However they more correctly danced sous le pont d’Avignon" (Under the bridge of Avignon). They would have danced beneath the arches of the bridge on the (the Ile de Barthelasse , the island in the middle of the river.
I have included the words below:
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse, l’on y danse
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse tous en rond
Les beaux messieurs font comm’ çà
Et puis encore comm’ çà
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse, l’on y danse
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse tous en rond
Les bell’ dames font comm’ çà
Et puis encore comm’ çà
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse, l’on y danse
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse tous en rond
Les jardiniers font comm’ çà
Et puis encore comm’ çà
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse, l’on y danse
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse tous en rond
Les couturiers font comm’ çà
Et puis encore comm’ çà
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse, l’on y danse
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse tous en rond
Les vignerons font comm’ çà
Et puis encore comm’ çà
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse, l’on y danse
Sur le pont d’Avignon
L’on y danse tous en rond
Les blanchisseus’s font comm’ çà
Et puis encore comm’ çà
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