Punting on the Cam in Cambridge
Susan suggested we should try punting on the Cam in Cambridge. So we drove to the Trumpington Park and Ride station on the outskirts of Cambridge (it's a nightmare to park and drive in Cambridge) and caught the bus into town. It drops you off outside the John Lewis store right in the middle of the city. From there, it's quite easy to walk down to the river.
Cambridge is a very vibrant University City. Despite the fact that it is Summer break, there were still a lot of students of various Nationalities milling about. There are also multitudes of bikes here. It's like every student has one!
We love the ancient old buildings of the Universities. Kings College (built by Henry the VIII and several other Kings) is quite magnificent. Also Queens College, St Johns and Trinity Colleges. Some of these colleges are extremely wealthy...worth up to a billion dollars.
We arrived at the riverside and were standing on a bridge overlooking the punts when we were approached to buy tickets for a punting ride. It was still quite early, so not too busy and we leapt at the chance.
We were lucky to have a very nice young man, Anthony to steer our boat. Some people had opted to steer themselves and were having all kinds of trouble steering their boat. It's harder than it looks and you have to have good balance and remember to duck when going under the low bridges!
Anthony also was a font of knowledge about the colleges and explained the history of all that we were seeing. It was well worth the money for a 45 minute punt up and down the river.
Afterwards we found a bakery/tea-room to have sausage rolls and Eggs Benedict for lunch. The shop frontage was quite deceiving. It looked like a small quaint bakery, but when you go inside it opens up like the Tardis and there was lots of seating inside.
We had a firther wander round Cambridge, looking at the famous Round Church and trawling through the open markets, as well as dipping into some of the shops. It was a lovely day out.
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