It is a work by António Teixeira Lopes and pays tribute to the tragedy of the “Bridge of Boats” (Ponte das Barcas), occurred in this place back on March 29th, 1809. That bridge consisted of 20 boats linked by steel cables, a project by Carlos Amarante inaugurated on the August 15th, 1806. History has it that during the Peninsular War, at the time of the second French invasion, under the command of the Marshall Soult, as the troops invaded the city, the people of Porto desperately started running onto the bridge. You can imagine the weakness of a bridge made of boats…well, the boats split, and many people died in the Douro river waters – some advance numbers as high as 4000 people, but the real number was never known. Nowadays, people of Ribeira still remember this tragedy with sadness, almost as if they have lived during that time. We go for a walk through the narrow streets of the medieval city.

Photo By Joseolgon - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0