Daily Details: July 23

Today was a trip to Cambridge. It was a FANTASTIC day and in my opinion, blows London clear out of the water. Cambridge, the town, is wonderfully quaint and there is charming architecture surrounding you on every side. The pace here is much slower, and I was very grateful to get away from the hectic London scene. We met our tour guides and headed over to an ancient church—sorry, the name escapes me. It was a very homey church, tucked into Cambridge, and I loved it very much. Each wall had three separate wallpapers on it, but somehow it worked. Each kind of wallpaper was beautiful. The windows were all stained glass. The chapel was quite simple compared to other churches we’ve seen, but I could see myself attending church there if I had lived in that time and was part of that religion—it was all very homey.
Our next stop was to visit the Cambridge campus itself. We saw many of the different colleges and then made our way to the King’s Chapel that is part of the Trinity College. It is built in the Gothic style, and was absolutely MAGNIFICENT! The exterior is very intricate, as is typical of the Gothic style, and stained glass filled the entire space. The ceiling has one of the best and most elaborate examples of fan vaulting. It is a miracle that the King’s Chapel has survived the way it has because most cathedrals were ruined by occupying forces during that time period. It is speculated that the only reason the stained glass is still intact is because the occupying forces camped out inside the chapel and it the glass helped keep the place a little more insulated than it would’ve been without it. Our tour guide pointed out some fascinating things that are present in the stained glass, much of which is not religiously centered, but political. Something that made me a bit furious was that whenever the devil was depicted, it was a woman. You see, Cambridge was VERY anti-female, and it wasn’t until the late 1940’s that women were allowed to attend school there. I was blown away by how that archaic school of thought lasted for so long!

We broke for lunch and headed to a famous pub in Cambridge called the Eagle. This was the happening place for U.S. soldiers in WWII. Graffiti is present on the ceilings inside the pub with soldier’s and their girlfriend’s names. I ordered authentic fish and chips and was amazed to see the huge portions come my way! The fish (cod) was INCREDIBLE, the chips were divine, and it was served with a piece of white bread and butter and mushy peas. What are mushy peas, you might ask, and why do they sound so terrible? I don’t know, to be honest. All I know is that I decided to give them a try, even despite the fact that I’m not a pea lover, and I was pleasantly surprised. They were buttery like mashed potatoes and even had a similar texture. Well fed, we had a little bit of time to peruse the flea market nearby before heading to the Fitzwilliam, another museum here in Cambridge.

I really enjoyed the short amount of time that we had at the Fitzwilliam. There, I saw more Rubens, Monets, Degas, and a beautiful ancient harpsichord. Our tour guide gave fascinating explanations of the paintings he showed us that really made them come to life. In fact, I learned how two of our common expressions started. The first one is the expression, “a red letter day”. Its origin comes from the ancient illuminated manuscripts, or illustrated pages of the Bible. Black ink could be obtained quite inexpensively, but red ink was very costly. Therefore, red ink was only used for the headings of chapters or especially important passages, so now we call especially important days red letter days. The second expression is when something is said to cost “an arm and a leg”. Our tour guide began showing us many different portraits of people and asked us if we could see anything they had in common. He then pointed out to us that more often than not, a man’s hand is tucked into his jacket, only one arm is showing on a lady, etc…He said this was because if you wanted an artist to paint your arms, or hands especially, the portrait would cost a great deal more since those required quite a bit more effort on the artist’s part to paint. I thoroughly enjoyed learning the origins of those expressions and finding out that they came from art.

Our tour ended, we thanked our guide, and took a rainy walk over to where we were going punting. Punting is much like a gondola ride, except it is given by students of Cambridge and you float along the Cam river in a much less luxurious boat. All the same, it was an extremely enjoyable time and we were able to comfortably take in the BEAUTIFUL scenery and architecture that is present on the Cambridge campus. We even saw a bridge and a building where parts of the Harry Potter movies were filmed!

After doing a bit of shopping, it was time to bid Cambridge farewell. I was so sad to leave, having had a blast there, but all the same I enjoyed relaxing on the train ride home. I always enjoy the trains—it gives me time to reflect upon all sorts of things. I can’t wait for more train rides to come!