Cambridge Colleges

Master's Lodge, Christ's

Entrance to Christ's

We haven't been at all good about trying to achieve our goal of seeing all thirty-something colleges in the University.  So we knocked 4 off the list last weekend, getting up early to take advantage of the nice sunny morning before the rainy afternoon.  We didn't realize it was the half-marathon so didn't think we could even cross the road to get to most of them, but eventually we found the crossing spot and managed to execute our plan.  The colleges are like cloisters.  You enter off the busy road through a big gate in a wall (the Porter's Lodge), and when you enter the college it is like going through the rabbit hole and emerging in another world.  Typically you enter through the oldest "court" which is a square of very old buildings with green space in the middle (those famous lawns).  Then you go through more gates to progressively newer courts, passing various gardens and standard buildings like the Master's Lodge, Chapel, Library, Tutorial Offices, Residences and (Dining) Halls.  Many things are not open to the public. Eventually you end up in the newer parts of campus which have modern buildings.  Some of the colleges front the river and in fact span over to the other side.  Their age and who studied there is truly amazing.

We saw:

• Christ's College: Founded 1505.  Alums include Charles Darwin and John Milton.



Entering G&C



G&C towards Senate House

• Gonville and Caius College: Founded 1348 (4th oldest). Alums include Francis Crick and Stephen Hawking.

• Trinity College: Founded 1546 by Henry VIII.  Alums include Isaac Newton, Niels Bohr, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Bertrand Russell, and even Prince Charles.
 

Trinity Gate

 



Entering Trinity

 

• St. John's College: Founded 1511.  Alums include William Wordsworth.

St. John's

St. John's across the Cam

We've also been to

• Emmanuel College (my host college, founded 1584)
• Queen's College (noted in a prior post, founded 1448)
• King's College (founded 1441, visited most recently last night for the following concert)

Foundation Concert: Haydn Celebration

Saturday 14 March 2015, 5.30pm

The Chapel

John Wallace, alumnus, is a well known and virtuoso exponent of Haydn’s ground-breaking trumpet concerto. Haydn’s Mass in Time of War is one of his celebrated late mass settings.

• Haydn: Te Deum
• Haydn: Organ concerto in C
• Haydn: Trumpet Concerto in E flat
• Haydn: Paukenmesse – Missa in Tempore Belli

Cambridge catch up

We have devoted a day of each of the last two weekends to catching up on our Cambridge sights.

Last weekend we finally visited Kettle's Yard, a really quirky and great little art museum.  A former art curator bought some cottages in a former slummy area and made them into a home where he could display his own collection.  He would open up the house to the public in the afternoons and also hold concerts (like our living room chamber music concert event!). Now the university owns it and runs it the same way.  The art is everywhere and not particularly labeled, but it is interesting and the house itself is also cool.  Too bad we didn't make it to a concert.  Attached to the house is a newer more traditional gallery, and a very old church is also on the property.

We then went to the see the Annual Spring Revue of the Footlights Club - a group of comic writer-performers at the university with some very famous alum such as John Cleese and Emma Thompson. Seems similar to Second City when it was at UChicago.  Anyway, they were very clever and we quite enjoyed it, especially when we could actually understand some of the UK-centric jokes.

Last but not least, we finally heard the famous King's College Choir during Evensong.  The acoustics are horrible for understanding the service, but they are great for the choir.  Because it is the 500th chapel anniversary year, there was a special organ concert afterwards as well.

Snow!

It has actually been snowing here, which seems to make people a bit giddy.  Although by snow I mean some squalls when you look out the window.  It hasn't been sticking which is too bad because I've seen pictures and it is lovely.  The most we've seen is some snow sticking to parked cars. As previously noted, it rarely gets below freezing here.  Despite this it does seem rather cold which is a bit puzzling.  Is it the wind?  Perhaps the damp?  We are not sure why but even if it hasn't rained, when we go out in the morning the streets are soaked.

On Friday we went to a string quartet at Emma.  Someone subsidized a free recital every term, and this time it was the Cavaleri Quartet playing the Mozart Quartet in D minor K. 421 followed by the Shostakovich Quartet in C minor, op. 110.  Despite being free and told to get there early as it fills up, it was rather empty.  We thoroughly enjoyed the program of two very different pieces.  We then went to the Chinese restaurant from the week before for dinner, but without our local host we didn't order as well.

On Thursday we went to the Microsoft Distinguished Lecture talk to hear Tony Hoare.  He is known for amazingly many things (he is a Sir after all) - including the Dining Philosophers problem which was influential in my choice to go into computer science.  Microsoft Research is in a fancy new building which is actually on the same street as our flat and reminded us of the new CS building at U of Edinburgh. After the talk there was a very good canape and drinks reception where Mark's inner grad student went crazy and free dinner was obtained.  The "canapes" were all sorts of Asian inspired hor d'oevres and were admittedly quite tasty as these things go.

The Rest of the Week

Winter Jasmine

Geranium

Snowdrops

It is amazing how many things are in bloom here, although this weekend we are under a "cold weather alert" (level 3!).  This seems to just mean it might get below freezing.

We have a very nice walk to the Engineering Building through a pretty residential neighborhood.  Although someone told us that our flat is in a bohemian area, it seems to get pretty ritzy a block or two away. Here is a house for sale for over 2 million US $.  Most houses have nice front gardens as shown in the photos above.  It is a bit of a treacherous walk though as the pavement (sidewalks) are sloped and very slippery when wet which is most of the time.  And the street lighting is really poor for our walk home in the dark.  Even at midday the sun never really gets high in the sky.

I went to the cinema to see The Imitation Game.  Turing in fact was a student at Cambridge.  At least in the theatre I went to, you buy a ticket with an assigned seat.  The pre-movie trailers and ads were quite different than at home.

Today we went to see a free organ recital by Jack Spencer, with a program that was unusual and varied and which we both enjoyed:

Litaize - Épiphanie
Karg-Elert - Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern (No. 64, Op. 65)
Buxtehude - Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern (BuxWV 223)
Messiaen - Desseins éternels, Les mages (Nos. 3 and 8 from La Nativité du Seigneur)
Dubois - Marche des Rois Mages
Reger - Fugue from Fantasia and Fugue on the Choral ‘Wie schön leucht’ uns der Morgenstern’ (No. 1, Op. 40).

The Chapel

The Organ

The concert was held in  Queens' College Chapel, which also gave us an excuse to see that College.  Mark had the excellent idea that we should attempt to visit all 29 colleges of Cambridge University in our 3 months here. Queens is quite lovely and spans the river.  The Cloister Court has a really old timbered building (the oldest building on the river), and Mark found that he has a namesake (a Sanskrit expert it turns out).

After the concert we went to the Fitzwilliam Museum to see Silent Partners - a show about mannequins that is about to end.

Weekend Excursions

Turns out that our first weekend was long due to a Monday bank holiday.  And the arrival rain turned into partly sunny weather in the 60s.  Although it seems chilly, the plants are a bit ahead of Pittsburgh as the tulips are at their end while lilacs are already in full bloom.

Grantchester Meadows Walk on the River Cam

On Saturday we took over a 5.4+ mile walk to Orchard Tea Garden in Grantchester.  The walk has paths through both meadows and by the river.  Grantchester itself is a very cute little village with a nice church.  Even though it is so close to Cambridge, we felt like we had escaped the big city and entered another world.

In the evening we went to the Festival of the Voice gala concert (which we had seen on a poster) at Trinity College Chapel. Little did we know that the Hilliard Ensemble was retiring and feted by three other ensembles.  Instead of ice cream during the interval as in Scotland, here our tickets got us wine.  But still no free programs!

Walking through the park to Ely Cathedral

On Sunday we took a short train ride to Ely to see the Cathedral, which is one of the nicest we've seen.  Beautiful stained glass, interesting octagonal tower, and very well signed throughout.  Whilst there we observed a special pet service.  We also went into the Stained Glass Museum which was well worth the admission.  The town was also holding its annual Eel Festival, but that was disappointing.  Instead we had tea at the Samovar Tea House.  We returned to the Cathedral for Evensong services complete with boy's choir, then walked by the river before returning to Cambridge.

On Monday we went to two gardens open for charity via the National Garden Scheme. The first garden (Upwater Lodge) was amazing.  The Wisteria-covered house was built by the owner's grandfather over 100 years ago and fronted onto a brook and the river, had a sheep herd,  a lawn tennis court, vineyard, and many many gardens - meadows, vegetable, perennials.  The next house was more normal, and we also had a yummy Delia Smith homemade date/ricotta/hazelnut cake with tea in the garden chatting with locals.  Walked back via the river where a cow seemed to have gotten stuck in the water.