DIARY OF AN ADVENTURER: THE UNIVERSITY TOWNS

I couldn't come this far from home and not visit the place that gave my home town its name. I was expecting Cambridge, UK to be similar to the Cambridge in New Zealand, but I couldn't have gotten it more wrong. This Cambridge was huge, and had a lot more students than it did older people! I couldn't visit Cambridge and not also go to Oxford. Although I am slightly more bias towards Cambridge, because of the name, I think I preferred Oxford because it is a bigger town with more things for tourists to see and do. It was great to visit both quite close together as I could compare the two a lot easier.

Both Cambridge and Oxford Universities are made up of Colleges, self-governing corporations within the university. This means that each college is almost like an individual university where the students belong and attend lectures and live within, but the final exams are all taken together as a collective university. Oxford has slightly more colleges than Cambridge's 31 (37) probably being the main reason why Oxford is a bigger town.

Cambridge

In Cambridge, I learnt that the town got its name from the river which runs through, called the river Cam. Katie and I decided to do punting on the river as all the colleges were closed to visitors. Punting is not what I thought it would be. The 'punter' has a long pole and uses it to push off the bottom of the river to push the boat along.

Some of the universities are situated next to the river, with bridges to cross over between them. We saw Cambridge's most famous college, Kings College, Queens College, Trinity College, St. Johns College, Darwin College, and passed under Cambridges very own Bridge of Sighs. This was a great way to see a different angle of the Colleges that we couldn't see from the front. They were so beautiful and really huge!

The punting took about an hour and by this stage we were super hungry and went to the pub that DNA was discovered in - shows you how old the place is! It also had some graffiti from World War II airmen covering the ceiling and walls. After lunch we spend the afternoon walking through the streets and exploring the city. There were so many amzaing looking buildings, as if each unversity was trying to be the most impressive.

Some of the university grounds were open and they all had amazing gardens fulled with flowers. If I was to be a student here I don't know which College I would have chosen! Our final adventure in Cambridge was to find Mill Road. I found it so cool that despite being on the others side of the world, I could still walk down Mill(s) Road, Cambridge!

Oxford

When we arrived in Oxford I could immediatly tell it was a bigger city than Cambridge. Katie and I decided to do a walking tour as we didn't really know where to begin! The tour guide we had was a sweet old lady who had lived in Oxford all of her life and knew so much about the city. She also knew a lot of fun facts and showed us The Queens College where Rowan Atkinson studied Mechanics, New College where Hugh Grant attended, as well as Merton College where J.R.R Tolkien wrote the Lord of the Rings.

After lunch we climbed the tower of the old University Church. The views from the top were great and really helpful for working out our bearings. We could see the colleges and where the river flowed near the city. After climbing down, we decided to see Christ Church, the most famous of Oxford's colleges but as it was starting to get dark, and it was quite expensive, we decided not to bother going inside but explored the grounds instead.

Oxford was used as inspiration for the Harry Potter films, with some parts actually being filmed in Oxford. Unfortunately, the Divinity School, which was the Hogwarts infirmary in four of the films, and The Duke Humfrey's Library which was the Hogwarts library, were both closed because the roof had collapsed. Christ Church held the grand staircase that was used in the first two films.

The last stop on our day in Oxford was to see Einstein's blackboard in the Museum of the History of Science. It was used on 16 May 1931 during his lectures while visiting the University of Oxford, and was one of three. This made me realise quite how old Oxford actually is and how deep the history really goes!

Oxford, not to be beaten by Cambridge also had a Bridge of Signs, but this one did not cross any water. I learnt a lot about the history between Oxford and Cambridge. They date back to around 1208. Oxford was there first but Cambridge was founded by scholars taking refuge from hostile townsmen in Oxford. They are the two oldest universities in the United Kingdom.

"Travel makes one modest. You see what a tiny place you occupy in the world.” – Gustave Flaubert

I hope this has inspired you.

LARISSAJODEE x

#friends #harrypotter #travel