Cambridge & East Anglia

Hi all,
It is 5 pm as I write this blog and it is pitch black outside! The weather lately has been very cool and wet, and are very envious of Melbourne's weather at the moment. Andy and Kristin are suffering through work and are certainly in countdown mode. Billy and Declan are still enjoying school, both are playing in the school rugby teams (Y8 and Y10) and Declan is also goalkeeper for the Year 8 Football (it is better known as soccer!). Billy has been doing cooking this term at school and has made some lovely dishes - the highlight being the Spicy Tomato Soup.

This weekend we headed East. We drove for and about three and a half hours Saturday morning and arrived at a village called Lavenham. Lavenham is in Suffolk, and as the Lonely Planet guide suggests "there is hardly a straight line in the whole topsy-turvy Lavenham, Eastern England's loviest medieval wool town", and I think they maybe correct! Checkout our photos and you will see buildings leaning at all angles. There is a lovely old church, Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, built about 1485.

From Lavenham, we headed to Ely about 15 miles North East of Cambridge. Ely has a fantastic cathedral and is your classic Georgian town.  As the whole surrounding area is extremely flat the Ely cathedral is visible from quite a distance in all directions. Ely is situated in the Fen lands of East England. A lovely city and we thought that we should have spent a year in this Ely, not Ely Cardiff!

We arrived in Cambridge mid-afternoon in very dark and rainy conditions, and after a quick drive around the city, we decided to go to our accommodation, Arnie's Guest House. We have stayed in varying degrees of accommodation this year in a lot of different cities and countries, but unfortunately, Arnie's was one of our worse! Less said about it the better! On Saturday night, we caught the bus into the city centre and had a wander around before meeting up with Mike (we met earlier in the year in Turkey) and having a few drinks and a meal at "The Castle" hotel, a nice little pub near "Castle Mound".

Sunday morning, after our non-existent full English breakfast and cold toast, we walked around the city and focussed mainly on the colleges. After a dismal Saturday, weatherwise, Sunday morning was lovely in Cambridge (although a little cool!). Our first sight was the Fitzwilliam Museum, a grand neoclassical building, then we walked through the grounds and buildings of Peterhouse College (the first college in Cambridge -1284).

Next we went down to the River Cam by Queen's College and watched the "tourists" being "punted" along the river. Then we headed into King's College, probably the most impressive of all the college's, and it's Chapel worthy of being a cathedral in most citiess! The grounds were immaculate and buildings very impressive! We also walked pass the colleges of Trinity, St. John's and Magdalene. We managed to get a photo of The Bridge of Sighs (the 3rd Bridge of Sighs we have seen this year, Oxford and Venice being the others)!

There was a market in the city centre, which Kristin was very happy to see and after a quick lunch we headed off back to Cardiff! Lucky that we are now experienced traveller's of the UK, because our Sat Nav was not charging off the cigarette lighter and we had to navigate our own way home! It wasn't that hard, but if it was earlier in the year we may still be in Cambridge!

Checkout the photos in the Web Albums, and if you have a bit of time on your hands (and unlimited internet use) have a look at the Fireworks (around Bonfire night - Guy Fawkes - we had several nights of fireworks going off around the area and we had our own fireworks display!)

cheers,
Andy

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