Cambridge with kiddies

Yesterday Lindsay, the kids and I went into Cambridge for a little sight-seeing. We rode bicycles and I was surprised to find out that taking a bike is almost as fast as taking the bus. There is also a parking lot of bicycles where you can lock them up for free. We then walked for a while and they they took me through all of these cute little alleys and backways. Apprently, most of the bridges the go over the Cam river are owned by the colleges and you can't use them unless you pay to get into the college. But of course my wonderful tour guides took me over one of the only public bridges.

We then found a nice pub and sat outside right on the river and I was re-acquainted with the wonders of English cooking. Fa-bu-lous (ick...everthing picked and fried and flavoured with boring). But you couldn't beat the atmosphere. We then went punting, as this is the thing to do. Our tour guide's name was Frank and Frank deftly steered us around all of the amateurs screaming in all kinds of different languages as they tried to steer the lumbering rafts along the water. He also told us about the colleges as we sailed by. There are a variety of interesting bridges to go under including one designed by Newton called the mathematical bridge. Legend has it that initially it needed no bolts or supports of any kind but it was somehow destroyed. Another bridge has a section of a concrete ball chopped out of it. Frank had stories explaining these phenomena but I think that part of the job of being a punter is to come up with imaginative lies to tell the tourists. Whatever. It was a lie. But an entertaining lie. And in the end, isn't that the real truth? The answer is no.


Anyhoo, I returned to Cambridge this afternoon after a bried trip to the teeny tiny Histon Public Library. I spend a couple of hours in the Cambridge University Botanical Gardens. They were a nice way to spend a couple of hours. There is a greenhouse complex with interesting fragile plants from around the world. There is a miniature bamboo forest...not exactly Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon but still interesting for someone who has only see little bamboos chopped up into 8 inch sticks and put into water with rocks. I think that the best time to visit the Rose Garden is probably not in late August. There are may clusters of flora to look through and all in all very relaxing.

I then walked back into downtown and managed to find the tourist information booth. By the time I found it I decided that I was staying in Cambridge for the weekend. Friends in York were just not getting back to me and there are still many, many things that I want to do here. I want to go into the Colleges for one thing so I picked up some information on a two hour walking tour. I'll take that tomorrow morning after Mark and Lindsay leave at the crack of dawn for the airport. Poor them. They are actually leaving at 5am.

Well, I think I had better go see what else I can do to help them get ready.