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We were on our way to Bath on Thursday, but first I wanted to go to "craft group". I finally remembered to take a few photos.
We spend more time talking than knitting sometimes, but that is not such a bad thing.
Our leader Janet is on the far right.
I left early to meet Alex to catch the train for Bath.
As instructed, we filled out the census forms.
Fun to think that when this census is released in 100 years people will know we were here. I wonder if the blog will last that long. I bet not. Electronic media is a bit of an archivist's nightmare.
After spending yesterday morning reading, blogging, and getting caught up on a few things, I went out to do a few errands, including picking up the bike. They had to replace the tire as well as the tube, so it cost more, but the ride is much better. I think the tire had been failing for a while, and I just did not notice it.
This is the bike parking under the shopping mall.
I wandered around to a few shops, and ended up in the late afternoon outside Corpus Christi College, where Prince Charles was attending a meeting on higher eduction. So I stuck around with the crowd to see him come out. If I had known how long it would be, I might have gone for coffee and come back, but I had fun listening to the various conversations and watching folks navigate the traffic on King's Parade.
There were plenty of undergraduates around, some waiting to see him, others making dismissive comments and being too cool to care about royalty. There were several security guys, and the porter, at the entrance to the college. I was impressed that the porter knew almost all the students who belonged in the college, and he would wave them right through. He did stop a few for id.
The crowd grew, and eventually a few police officers showed up and did a little traffic direction. But the street is not really wide enough for cars to pass when there is no crowd, and no royal cars (a Range Rover and a Jaguar) parked a bit in the street. Crazy bikes and crazy taxi drivers, and a few buses and lories, and you can imagine the mess.
There he is, he has on a yellow daffodil in support of a cancer charity.
One of the things the two students behind me were talking about is that one of his body guards got higher marks at Trinity College than Prince Charles did. Not sure it is true, but I love that they were discussing it!
He worked the crowd on the other side a bit.
It would be nice if the Royals could get on with this part of their job, the publicity for good causes, taking the really long (multi-generational) view of issues, and being a uniting force in the country and even in the commonwealth. Unfortunately, they seem to end up in the press for mis-behaving, just like American celebrities. It is a shame, because if they did it well there could be a real benefit from having such a group of people, who have the long term interests of the nation as their job. The politicians are not set up to do that, no matter what we would like to think.
Our first stop Sunday morning was Station Cycles, under the Grand Arcade Shopping Center (next to Lyon Yard), to drop off my sad bike for a new tire. At home we do these things ourselves, but we don't really have to tools here. The bike will be ready on Monday.
Then we went up into the mall, to return some library books.
The library was not quite open yet (we were there about 5 min before noon) so we wandered about a bit.
It is great that the library is in the mall. I think the library was there first, but still, why not have the books where people go. There were plenty of people waiting to get in right before it opened.
Other than having a library, this mall looks like many in the US. But it was created by building that roof over two existing rows of buildings.
Bulk candy on the ground floor is popular, I have never seen it empty like this. But there were about six people off to the left of this photo buying from the other table.
We returned the library books, and then went for lunch at a tiny coffee shop Alex had heard good things about. We spent most of the afternoon reading and writing at Cafe Nero, and then came home for dinner.
Alex cooked stir fry, which was great, as usual. For two people, the little kitchen is fine, if not the most expansive (there is no counter space!).
We set out on Saturday to do a few things in Cambridge and then bike to Anglesey Abby, a National Trust property about 6 miles outside Cambridge.
There were plenty of people in the city centre, and, as usual, no places in the bike racks.
We went to a book sale in a church, and wandered a bit, before setting off down the Newmarket Road.
The first part of the ride, in the city, was not that interesting, except in that way that interesting means dangerous, like navigating large traffic circles on a bicycle. But soon we got to the nicer bits. And plenty of helpful signs.
The bike path runs right along the motor way for a while.
But then we switched to the public footpath, which was lovely. One of the interesting things was that the path, and the water, were higher than the farmland around us. This is fen country, and all of the land has been drained (thank you Dutch engineers). If you have read Dorothy Sayers' The Nine Tailors, you get the idea. So what looks natural and wild is really all of human construction. This land should basically be a swamp.
Notice my coat is in the basket, it is getting warmer!
Beautiful area. This is just before getting to the edge of the National Trust property.
We walked and rode, depending on the condition of the trail. And I noticed that the ride was harder and bumpy. I put that down to being a bit "off road," but in fact I was getting a flat tire. We noticed it as we were approaching the Abby. We had to walk a ways to get from the public footpath to the front of the abby. We parked the bikes in a rack, and went in to ask about any local bike shops. There are none. So we had lunch, it was after 2 by then, and talked about what to do. In the end, looking at the place, and thinking about a long walk back, we did not go into Anglesey Abbey, but decided it would be a lovely place to bring Linda and the children when they come in a few weeks (via bus). We started the walk back along the main road, rather than winding back around to the public footpath. It was more direct, but there were plenty of cars, and not too much extra room along the edge. Alex rode ahead to see if there might be a bike shop in the town we had passed, but it turned out that the sign reading "Bike Store" meant a place to store bikes, not a shop.
Well, what is a six mile walk? Actually, it would have been a lovely walk, if I had been wearing better shoes, and not pushing a bike.
We stopped in Stowe-Cum-Quy, where Alex was able to give directions to a Spanish cyclist who wanted to ride back to Cambridge. We did not, however, meet anyone with a bike pump and a patch kit, so we walked all the way.
We stopped for a few minutes to look at the church in Stowe-Cum-Quy.
At some point the church lights by the road had been changed from gas to electric, and now the electric uses a CFL.
Signs marked the way back to Cambridge (the little image is a graphic to represent King's College Chapel).
The flat tire.
The milage marks are very approximate. There were three in a row that said 5, and then two that said 4. But the fact that there are National Cycle Routes (marked here with the 51) is very cool. What would it take for the United States to create national bike routes?
The entrance to the Cambridge Jubilee Cycleway from the Newmarket Park-and-Ride.
We walked back this way since it is more direct to our neighborhood than going back through town, and by this time the bike shops were closed.
We had dinner at the Waterman, a pub not far from our house. We had been there once before, and it was nice. When we got there it was almost empty, just a few fans watching football. But soon after we arrived a large group (that kept getting larger) of people arrived. They had been playing some kind of role-play fantasy sward and guns game. They all had plastic weapons, some toys, some handmade, and a few were dressed in bad approximations of medieval garb. We never did find out what they had been playing, but it made dinner interesting!
We moved on to the Tivoli down the street for a more quiet dessert.
I have been looking in several cycle shops for skirt guards, or coat guards, as they are sometimes called, to take back to California and put on my Electra Townie. It turns out, although they come on some English bikes, they are not so common these days, and most shops do not cary them. Online, I found Chris's Bikes, "a Friendly Bike Shop in the North of Cambridge City" which said they had them. So on Friday off I rode toward Girton.
In 1869,Girton College was opened as the first women's residential college in Cambridge. It has a beautiful large campus, and when I was here before we went there for a summer production of Hamlet in the garden, and I knew that they had created such a lovely big college for women by putting it far outside the rest of the town. But it was a nice day for a 2 mile bike ride.
I found the road, but it did not look like a place where there would be shops of any kind.
But eventually I found one small group of shops, including Chris's Bikes
The website did not lie, Chris was very friendly, and I got two different kinds of skirt guards, since I was not exactly sure how each kind would fit on the fenders. And it was much easier to get them since I was there, than worry about guessing wrong.
The ride back was quicker, a bit downhill.
And the sun was coming out.
I dropped the skirt guards at the house, and then went into the city center for shopping and coffee.
This beautiful pink tree was blooming outside Great Saint Mary's.
Students were out protesting new student fees (£9000 a year!). I love that the sign is in Latin (it does not please).
They were gone by late that evening.
I had coffee at Nero, and then met Alex in front of King's to go to Choral Evensong. Again, amazing.
Then we had dinner at Jamie's Italian, Jamie Oliver's Cambridge restaurant. The food was fantastic, as one would expect.
Although the 8 hour time difference makes it hard on weekdays, we do enjoy talking to the children on FaceTime. We stayed up late on Tuesday to chat.
Elizabeth is clearly multi-tasking here, I think she is looking at the keyboard, rather than the chat.
Daniel still seems to love his Cambridge hat!
On Monday and Tuesday I was out and about. On Monday I walked along the Cam, and loved every little sign of spring.
Plenty of birds enjoying the sun.
This swan seemed to think she owned the place.
Spring flowers are up!
The sun creates beautiful reflections.
I walked for about an hour down the Cam, and turned around here.
I think this is the first photo of King's I have taken with blue sky in the background.
Our wonderful Blue Badge Guide, June, took us on a walk Tuesday afternoon. She brought us into the gardens at Peterhouse, even though the college was supposed to be closed to visitors. She does not seem to mind these signs much.
In a few more days this will all be yellow with daffodils. If you look closely you will see a few of them already, but with a few more sunny days all of them will bloom.
She also took us into the Judge Business School. It is in the old Addenbrook's Hospital building. The remodeling looks more like Disneyland than a business school, at least in the lobby.
Then we went into Downing College, where the crocus blooms are up.
I saw these in Sainsbury's.
I have been trying to get photos of the birds as they land in the back yard. Most of them come out blurry, but here are two that worked.
This bird sat on this branch through most of breakfast this morning, so it was not so hard to get his photo. Anyone know what kind of bird this is?
We filled up the bird feeders with bird peanuts (not for human consumption, I wonder what the difference is?) and these little birds like them. Not a great photo, but they don't want to stay still for long.
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