The Trip....Day II

Cambridge evidently was founded as a bridge over the river Cam. Who knew? Not quite a “Bridge Over Troubled Waters” but certainly a bridge over dirty, somewhat pretentious (or at least well educated) British waters.

All in all let me say it. A lovely town. And we had great weather. Two nice days of weather after what they said had been a miserably wet summer and early fall. We closed out night one after like 40 straight hours awake at a little French place that was lovely. I had to explain to Jon that the French restaurants generally use crappy cuts of beef and then hide them in sauce and this place was no different but it was still good. Then we went back to Valpo’s Cambridge residence and crashed.
I was worried I would wake up too early but when I finally cam to my wife told me it was 10:30. We were sleeping in little single things that felt like monks beds. The bathroom and shower were both down the hall but we got moving and walked about a mile to an open air market that had intrigued us.

I of course am obsessed by iced tea. I did not really comprehend that England, land of tea would not accommodate me but evidently in a tea culture, iced tea is an abomination. Once again, who knew? Still hope reigns eternal and I walked into a Starbucks and confidently ordered a Vente Black Iced Tea and the girl (American) said “I am sorry, we do not do iced tea”. I asked plaintively whether there was any place in England to get iced tea and she told me sadly, and with utter confidence...”no”. Still I persevered and walked down to Mc Donald's but did not even ask. On the board of drinks they had tea but it was away from soft drinks and next to coffee and they had no urns saying “sweet” and unsweet” I did not let this despair overtake me however.

We ate some meat pies which were pastries with a some cheese and sausage and “swede”. Swede i came to find out is turnip and rather then refusing to eat (the Becker natural reaction to anything different) I muscled through it and found it tasty. We bought some fresh squeezed orange juice at the market. It was delightful. We toured the market (boring) and then took our own walking tour of the town trying to find a noodle bar that had grabbed Sandy’s eye. We found it, “The Dojo” and decided we could live without it. We looked in a bunch of stores and bought Laura a puzzle.

We then bought tickets and went into The King’s College Cathedral. That was pretty awesome but could not figure out how to turn my flash off so could not take pictures inside. It was interesting listening tot he tour guides however and read the stuff on the construction. It was started in the 1400’s by Henry the 6th, one of the first Tudor Monarchs who was trying to legitimize himself through such spending. It has a lot of dragons in it in homage to St. George. It was an awesome church and it would have been nice to take some pictures of.

I went to a cheese monger (high point of trip) and bought some gruyere and some cheddar. They were life changing. We went back and got Jon who was now done with class and went down to the river Cam. They have these flat bottomed boats and they move along the river like gondolas but they pole them. We took a nice trip (having bought several beers to drink along the way, and then the Punter told us all about the history of the various colleges on the Cam including St. Johns, Trinity, King’s College and Queen’s College etc... They have all been there a very long time. All in all it was very cool with all the history and all the intellectual snobbery. If you go to Cambridge, go when it is warm and go Punting.

We then went to the grocery store and stocked our boy up with necessities and then went to a Spanish tapas place which seemed average to me but which he and my wife liked. We then went to a pub called Sir Issac Newton’s and I stood a drink for he and all his housemates. We came home and Sandy did the whole houses dishes and then we sat in bed an read and were kept awake for quite sometime by one of the young ladies in the group Skyping with her parents and then her boyfriend till all hours of the night. Then I passed out.