Cambridge, UK - an improv day trip

Three weeks ago, we went to brunch with Stu, a colleague of mine, his wife Kate, and two of their friends at a cute little spot in Little Venice. As we didn't have many plans afterwards, we joined them on a day trip to Cambridge, only a 45 minute train ride from King's Cross/St. Pancras station in North London.  It took as long to simply get from St. John's Wood to the train station given the standard weekend tube closures. Once we made it to the station we picked up tickets from the counter. Remember if going with 3 or more people, you can get discounted tickets, so don't default to the machines as humans are cheaper in this instance. We got to Cambridge at about 3pm and immediately charged across town to Jesus green and along the river, where we took in the great fall colors and crisp autumn air.

The goal was to punt, so we were discouraged for the first 15 minutes along the river as we saw only crew boats. We eventually found a nice spot to rent a boat to do a little punting on the Cam, only GBP15 for an hour of fun.

Stu is a surprisingly seasoned veteran in punting having taken on rivers all over England with his agile strokes, and looks to lead the US national punting team to next year's world championships of punting in Northumberland. Who would've thought the city boy from Texas would have the punting genes in him. [ok there are no world championships that I know of and I don't even think the US would have a team - the point is Stu basically owns the Cam].

The best way to take in the town is via the punt/boat, where you meander along the river past several of the colleges, all with beautiful campuses. As we punted from 4-5pm, it was when it was getting dark and the lights on the buildings along with sundown were magical. When walking around town, you don't get too much vision of the student life behind the school walls, so I highly recommend punting.

Following punting we were all thirsty and began our mini pub crawl around town, starting at the Pickerel Inn, an old pub dating back several hundred years. It was halloween so they had some decorations but not enough where it took away the charm of the pub. The staff was nice and joked around with us, the typical tourists. The beer on tap was good, with a range of Woodforde's ales and a couple others. The bar also had a fireplace and plenty of seating.

Following the Pickerel Inn, we went to the Castle Inn up the road, which had great food, an even better selection of beer and the pub itself was good too. It looked like they had a nice beer garden in the back for the summer. The pub has an outstanding range of Adnams ale and lager, with several great guest beers. I had one called the Wild Goose. A nice IPA that is more balanced than the US style pale ales due to more maltiness. As I only had my phone camera and it was too dark for good pics, credits for the Castle Inn photo go to Fancy a Pint, a great pubfinder website specializing in UK pubs.

We hit one last bar up and hung out with plenty of dressed-up students, including the great Doctor Proctor before heading back on the 10:45pm train to London to catch the last tube home.

For a last minute late-afternoon excursion it was a great trip; getting out of the city is always a welcome activity.