Day 18 of Romance Holiday
July 18, 2012

This morning we headed to Cambridge for the day. Of course the best way to get to Cambridge cheaply and easily is to take the train. On route Michael made a few choice comments about one of our blog readers (no name will be mentioned Yvonne) who is definitely wrong about how good the public transport is. Now as you all know, teenagers know everything so that pretty much settles it. London does have a great public transport. We took the tube to Liverpool Street Station and then the train up to Cambridge. Slight delay on the train because of a problem with a freight train but otherwise very smooth and easy.

When we got to Cambridge we took another open top bus tour. Definitely the best way to get a feel for the town. Though we had Michael Schumacher as our bus driver. Either that or he was trying to complete his rounds quickly so he could get home quickly. There were some roads I was holding on for dear life as the trees whipped past us. I kept hoping I would not get blown off the back of the bus.

You do get some great views of the different Colleges at Cambridge University. The one in the picture is the most famous and that is ‘Trinity College’. Most of them are beautiful old buildings with a courtyard and grass covered quad. Some of them (like Jesus College; Trinity College; Queens College) have enormous grounds as well. Cambridge has about 110000 residents of which about 15000 are students at Cambridge University. No Cambridge University student (there is another university in Cambridge believe it or not) is allowed to drive a car within 5 miles of the Cambridge. So they all have bicycles. They reckon that there are 35000 bicycles in Cambridge. It is noticeable how many there are. Michael remarked ‘There are nine million bicycles in Beijing” though (you have to be intelligent to get that one – reference Katie Melua in case you didn’t get it).

A quick lunch and a stop at Cinnabon for desert. I told them we shouldn’t be eating from Cinnabon as it is an American company and we are in the UK but no one listened. I am sure the American readers will be happy. And they were American sized ‘bons’ at that as well. Back onto the wonderful train and back into London and then onto the tube back to the flat. You can see we are making good use of the public transport!

This evening we had tickets booked for the London Eye. We walked from the flat (about a 15-20 minute walk). We have done it before but in the day so this was a first for us to do it at night. Of course Lara only told us half way up that she was scared of heights. She wasn’t alone though. There were two Americans who little liked they were scared witless. The views over London are fantastic.  Unfortunately it started raining about 5 minutes into the trip which messed up any photo taking opportunities on the one side. It also restricted our view. I did get some shots though and it is hard to pick which ones to include. The two at the end of today’s post are the before and after shot of the Eye as we walked to and from it.

In London (like in Paris) we have done a lot of walking. Everyone is also keen to get their shoes off and relax when we get back. Nice to be able to just kick back at the end of the day and watch some TV. That seems to be the end of most of the days this holiday.

 

One thought on “Day 18 of Romance Holiday

  1. Tell Lara that I can sympathize with her problem. It is odd height sensation. But she probably doesn’t neeed my sympathy so someone else should take over.

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