After a lovely dinner and enjoyable evening we retired to bed ready for our next-day tour.
Cambridge have provided a huge Park and Ride car park just outside the city and from there we were also able to board the open-top bus to take us on our tour. We were so lucky in this horrible summer of 2012 to have such marvelous weather.
What a marvelous service. On boarding (£9.00 for wrinklies) we were given a set of headphones each (small in-the-ear type) and advised that we could alight and re-board as many times as we wished throughout the day.
The route took us into the heart of Cambridge and the commentary gave out interesting facts about the route and about the major buildings and colleges which we passed on the route. We alighted in the city centre to do some shopping followed by lunch in an Italian Restaurant in the market square. We had a short walking tour around some of the colleges and quirky shops and Norma charmed the gate keepers of King's College into letting us in to take a few photographs without paying the usual entry fee.
Norma and the Gatekeeper. The Teddy you can see on
his shoulder (Eduardo) was on tour from Spain
and his story will be reported on separately
All around were young people politely asking us if we wanted to be taken for a punt on the Cam. Sadly we did not have enough time but if we go again we will definitely give it a try.
We stopped to listen to two violinists busking on the street and they gave a fabulous rendition of Winter from The Four Seasons.
All around us were old buildings and famous Colleges and about (so it felt) about 10,000 bikes. The constant mode of transport. Road bikes, mountain bikes, shopping bikes, all were being put to use to get around.
We later heard on the bus commentary that students are not allowed cars within five miles of their colleges but as this was the close-season for University Life it appeared that more than just students chose this are their means of transport.
We then visited what has to be the best stocked sweet shop I have ever seen. I asked, but they would not lock me inside overnight.
There was one black note on the day and that was caused by the tour-bus driver who failed to stop for us at a designated bus stop when we wished to board to complete our tour. Kathie banged on the side of the bus and he then stopped but argued that he had already picked up his passengers some 50 metres short of the stop and did not see us. He was most rude and set off before we had time to take our seats thus endagering Norma and Tommy who are both disabled. We asked that he stopped again and he invited us to leave his bus but we declined and took our seats on the upper deck. Norma was to report him but I don't know if she did or not.
We continued with our tour and discovered more interesting facts. One of them was that Cambridge University used to employ people to stand in the Railway Station to stop students from boarding trains during term time and thus keeping them from the high-life of London etc. The car park at the station had the first double-decker bike rack I have ever seen and there must have been at least a thousand bikes parked there or chained to any immovable object.
Back to the house for drinks and dinner and to meet Norma and Tommy's daughter and son-in-law. Great company and a great evening. We left mid-morning on the next day (still sunny) after what had been a short but very enjoyable visit.
Our thanks to our new friends for making it so.