It's A Phoenix

It’s been a long week, even if it only started on Tuesday after the long weekend and saying sayonara to mum n dad.

I’ve managed to close the door properly on the last few months of turmoil. Unfortunately, that doesn’t shut off what I need to, but that will happen eventually I hope. It’s a pity, but I needed to do it as those of you with the fuller picture already know... This is also the reason I have to apologise for the poor quality of pics I’ve posted on here over the last couple of months, as my tremor has steadily become worse and it doesn’t work too well with a light digital camera. Anyway, hopefully soon, I will finally get to have a full night’s sleep and I’ll stop losing weight.

So, a slow week of work ended with a few of the folks from work in the pub and a (video game) round of golf. After that it was on to the Three Crowns for a few more pints for Sue’s birthday. (You may recall her from the West Ham Away/It’s All Happening post.) Anyway, after avoiding another “note slid under that door I just closed” (ie; delete an unread sms message), I met up with Sue and Will, as well as their friend Lauren and her friend, Manón, (if I’ve spelt that correctly) for an interesting night. Turns out that Manón is a fellow cyclist and plans to do a cycling tour of the eastern states (of Australia). Not sure if we’ll make it out for a ride as she does live up in Newcastle, but you never know, and you can take a bike on a train...
When we all called it a night, I needed to trek along the full length of Stoke-Newington Church rd to get to a bus route that was a) still operating, and b) would get me home. This is a pretty interesting road as it winds its way through a rather ordinary area. The road itself is full of all sorts of pubs, cafes and shops and is very bohemian in style. I will definitely have to spend some more time here. In fact it became part of the plans for Saturday.

Saturday’s plan was to ride down to Borough Market in the morning, do some grocery styled shopping, including picking up some more of the excellent wildebeest meat. I then planned to ride back to Stoke-Newington Church rd (which is on the way) for lunch or brunch and a coffee somewhere along the road before heading home.
Well, Saturday just didn’t happen that way. Let’s just call it a “Doona Day” and leave it there. As I said above, things don’t automatically shut off once that door is closed. Anyway, I digress... I actually managed to read the full story of “Me and My Shadow”, which is the account of writer/director, Kevin Smith (who’s autobiography I’m reading) and the years he spent with his friend, Jason Mewes, and their fight to overcome Jason’s addiction to heroin and oxycontin. If ever there was an account of someone epitomising just exactly what is meant by “true friend”, then this is it. A powerful read as it chronicles the tale of his friend who becomes a junkie and their struggle over many years to beat it. A quick google of Kevin Smith and ‘Me and My Shadow’ and you should be able to find all 9 parts that make up this intriguing story.

Cambridge

Sunday morning, and after dodging 2 early morning calls and deleting 2 voicemails without listening to them, it was off to Cambridge for the day. I was told this was a beautiful spot to visit and I wasn’t disappointed. Even a fair bit of the countryside I passed on the train ride up there was really nice, although there always seemed to be some bit of man-made object in there to spoil the scene. I guess as a species, we just don’t get it at times...
I managed to cover a fair bit of ground and still have a leisurely time of it for a cruisey relaxed day out. Unfortunately, June is part of the exam period for the colleges, so most of them were closed or restricted in their access. That, however, didn’t stop me winding up in a couple of the colleges where I shouldn’t have been. At least it wasn’t a dull day.
I was amazed at the number of bikes around this township. They certainly outnumbered the cars and there were so many locked up to fences and bike racks everywhere. If you thought that finding street-side car parking was difficult, I actually saw folks struggling to find places to put their bikes!!
When I come back here, I’ll just bring my own with me. Don’t get me wrong, I found it easy enough to walk everywhere, but ‘when in Rome’...
Cambridge University itself is made up of many ‘colleges’ who all seem to slightly independent of each other, or perhaps competitive may be a better word. I managed to visit several of these, and Downing College was the first that I entered by mistake. I couldn’t get into Kings, which is the most famous college, helped in no small way by its very impressive ‘chapel’ - which is larger and more impressive than some churches!
Trinity College was one that I visited thanks to accidentally walking through the back entrance. After going past King’s college, and a visit to the market in the town square (see left), I wandered through some of the smaller laneways until I found myself at a bridge that crossed the river Cam and led into the parklands known as The Backs. From here I headed into those parklands in an effort to get onto the pathway that I saw heading along the banks of the river Cam. In the process I ended up heading down the pictured alley of trees and straight into Trinity College - oops!!
I then tried to cut through to St John’s college, which was their neighbour, and biggest rival, only to end up having to go back and around through the Backs until I found the main gate into St John’s. St John’s is the second richest/biggest college behind Trinity, and while it has the most impressive building (see pic), that building has a rather unique clock tower in that it doesn’t contain a clock. When they built this particular building, Trinity College found a local rule/law that stated that there can only be one clock within a certain area, and so hastily built their own before St John ’s could finish theirs. On I went, back to the main street of Cambridge via the bridge of sighs and St John’s College.
I then proceeded up this street past the round church until I reached Magdalene (pronounced Maudlin) College and one of the main berths for the punts. From here I noticed a walkway that led further along the river Cam, so decided to explore this before eventually discovering a very cruisey restaurant hidden down an alleyway (another advantage of being on foot!). I headed in, as it was 1.30pm and I hadn’t eaten at all yet, only to discover that they had a mezzanine area with an excellent riverfront view of both Magdalene college and the parklands to the northeast of it. So, to the sounds of Cafe Del Mar (#7 or 9 I think) I lunched with a couple of peroni and a pleasant view.
Having now done most of Cambridge from south to north, it was time to head south again, and riding a punt down the river Cam seemed an excellent way to do it. 15mins til the next one left so I happily sat on the bank watching others show me exactly why hiring one for myself would have been a bad idea. I still have no idea how this one group of folk didn’t end up in the river! Time to go, and with no other passengers, I got the seats all to myself.
The ride down to silver street was quite good as not only did I get to sit back and enjoy a completely different angle of the township, but the punter(?), or whatever you call the guy working the pole (damn, I have to be careful how I put that!), also gave me a guided tour of the places we passed.
Shortly after asking if many folks go into the river, and him telling me about poles getting stuck in the river bottom than we see exactly that - a lone pole sticking out of the water and a pole-less punt up ahead. I rescued the pole while he steered us towards the owner - good deed for the day #1 done.
From here I headed down past the lock and along the river until I discovered a hidden bridge through what looked to be a rather not-so-obvious path. This led me to the back of the FitzWilliam Museum and also the back of the Peterhouse College. Unfortunately, no way in, so around the rather large block I went to enter the museum through its main entrance. Impressive museum this one. The foyer alone was amazing (see attempted pic on the right). The Egyptian section was fascinating and complete with actual proper Egyptian cats (if you recall the one from the British Museum - see my earlier post ‘That Cat’s Back’). Unfortunately, the rest of the ancients areas - Greeks, Romans, etc... - were mostly pots and vases, and so resembled another large antique shop. Upstairs and there were mostly paintings from various regions and times. Again, like I found in the National Gallery a few years ago, anything that is pre-1800’s is completely dominated by the church as it’s just one religious painting after another. Don’t get me wrong here, as the artistry is fantastic, but it does get very same-same. Thankfully they did have some of John Constable’s and Picasso’s works there to make it worthwhile.
Back up Kings road to the Great St Mary’s, which is the main church that backs onto the market square (seen above in the background of the market photo). It has a tower that you can go up and view the town from. Usual deal, with tight spiral staircase and lots of steps (right). Nice view, but the roofs of Cambridge aren’t all that exciting.
Back to the train station via a couple more alleyway discoveries, the botanical gardens and that rounded out the day. Well, actually, a take away curry from down the road and a few episodes of Futurama rounded the day out, but who’s counting...