England, Day 2: Cambridge

Day two in the Merry Olde land took us to Cambridge.  We slept well, not feeling much jet lag, at least not yet.  Cheryl made me some "Manly Energy" herb tea and I was off like a shot!  Cambridge (from the river Cam, and the bridge that goes over it) isn't much on parking spaces, so we parked outside of town and rode a neato orange double-decker bus!

The roads into Cambridge were narrow and I applaud the bus driver for his skill in not ever driving on the sidewalk or into oncoming traffic.  We went immediately to the town square, where this town has been having markets for about, oh, over 1000 years!  So we went to the market and bought ostrich burgers…yummy.  This guy was really jammin' on his guitar…he really was good, but when I saw his face I was struck that this old looking very British guy looked just like Wallace, from Wallace and Grommit.  Dig the sideburns, Uncle!

This place is old (see above) and really beautiful…

…but unfortunately they aren't much on zoning, so there were soviet-looking concrete office buildings built right up against this majestic architecture.  I didn't take pictures of that stuff.  (Think Jason Borne in a room with one bare light bulb sewing up a bullet wound.)   I also saw and entered a quintessential British red phone booth (no phone any more, but pretty smelly.

Cheryl has always wanted to go "punting" on the river Cam, so we were the excuse she needed.  Off we went with some college student who was selling tickets and before we knew it we were punting!  Actually, we were sitting, he was punting.

We passed some cool bridges…

…and King's College (yes, THAT King's College)…

…and a cool old ivy-covered wall.  I noticed that our boatman was punting on the right side of the river, with other boats passing on our left.  When I asked why that was (instead of doing things the way they drive), without skipping a beat he said "the Cam flows all the way to the sea so this is essentially international waters."  I laughed hard and congratulated him with a fist bump (they do that in England too…he didn't leave me hangin').

I saw my spirit rock Easter Island head thing (I really want one for my back yard…

…and we ended the day by attending Evensong at the King's College chapel…I couldn't stop staring at the ceiling...

where Sue sang with the King's College Boys Choir!!!!!  (so did everyone else, but she sounded really great!)  This is all of us outside afterward.

It was a great day with great friends in a really cool place.  Something like 31 colleges in that one little town.  Oh, and this place...

is the pub where Pink Floyd got their start.  Cheryl was beside herself (and in this photo, beside the pub too!)  Thanks James and Cheryl, we had a wonderful day!