Cambridge

My friend, Adam, graduated from Robinson College, Cambridge, a few years ago. Since he lived in and loves the town, he offered to take me around. At the last minute, we decided to leave 2 hours earlier than originally planned. This was a very good idea, as many things were closed by 3:30.

We walked nonstop for 3.5 hours. We hit King's College chapel, walked through Clare's beautiful gardens (Nick Rutter goes to Clare), the gardens of his college, Trinity's Wren Library (where we saw a handwritten Winnie the Pooh, Newton's notebook, and other old books that had to do with Trinity) walked past the university library, and wandered through town. In the afternoon, we met up with his friend, Paul (who went to Trinity), and sat by the river for a bit. After the brief rest, we all went punting. We ended up on one of the bigger punts with a bunch of random people. The guys ended up exchanging stories with the punter or telling the versions of his stories they had heard. Let me tell you a couple of the fun ones:

- Trinity College was founded by Henry VIII. A statue of him appears above the main gate. In his left hand, he holds the royal orb. In his right, he holds....a wooden chair leg. Students stole the scepter and replaced it with what is still there today.
<-- Henry
- Some students somehow managed to climb to the top of King's College chapel and placed an orange traffic cone on one of the corner spires. The school brought in a scaffold company. Once the scaffolding had been set up, the students climbed up, again, and moved the cone to the other side of the building.
<-- King's College chapel R, Clare L
- There is a wooden mallard up high in the dining hall of Trinity College. Students attempt to sneak into the room after it's locked up, steal the mallard, take a picture of it with them as far away from Cambridge as possible, and return it without being seen. If successful, they take the picture to the dean and are admitted to the exclusive Mallard Club. They're invited to the Dean's summer garden parties. The mallard was never there when Paul went hunting for it.

- Porters are the first level of discipline. They stand around and wear bowlers. They can only enforce things if they are wearing their hats. Adam once had a porter walk up to him before realizing he wasn't wearing his hat. He walked all the way back to the porter place, fetched his hat, then returned to tell him off.

-Adam heard that this took place at Trinity. I think Paul said he heard that it happened at St. John's: Two students dressed up- one as a porter, one as an American tourist. The only people allowed to walk on the grass at the colleges are Fellows (i.e. profs/researchers, etc). The "American" began walking on the grass. The "porter" ran up to him, pulled a gun out of his belt, and shot a blank at the "American," who then dropped "dead." The "porter turned around, stuck the gun back in his belt, and said, "Damned tourists."
<- nonporter & American tourist
I am quite proud to announce the fact that I managed to stay out of the river when I volunteered to attempt to punt. I almost ran us head on into a bridge and another punt, but we all survived and kept dry.

After our wandering was complete, the 3 of us resumed our places underneath the beautiful weeping willow outside of Trinity and talked for a while. It was a picturesque way to end a perfect day (I don't know how I'm not sunburned) in an beautiful town.

For those of you on Facebook, my computer isn't letting me upload any of the 350 pictures I took during the day. Hopefully it will let me do so soon.