Ponte di Rialto

An amazing feat of engineering in its day, Antonio da Ponte’s 1592 marble bridge was for centuries the only land link across the Grand Canal. The construction cost 250,000 gold ducats, a staggering sum that puts cost overruns for the new Calatrava bridge into perspective. Now that the Rialto is clogged with kiosks and foot-traffic jams, locals go out of their way to avoid it, or zip up the less scenic northern side of the bridge. The southern side faces San Marco, and when crowds of shutterbugs and tour groups clear out around sunset, it offers a romantic long view of gondolas pulling up to Grand Canal palazzi, at striped moorings that look like floating barber poles.