Today we went to many places, including the famous Wren Library, located in the Trinity College in Cambridge. Cambridge is a quiet town on the outside of London. We planned to get there by train from Kings Cross, London station. We got to the train station by metro/underground rail, from Shepard’s Bush Station. To catch the earlier trains, we woke up earlier than normal that day and headed to the metro. We first bought round trip tickets for me and my parents at Shepard’s Bush Station then headed down. While we waited for the train I noticed that it was much more humid in the London metro than the Metro in the DC area. When the metro finally arrived, I also noticed that inside was extremely humid and the ceiling was rounder than the much flatter ceiling in DC it was also surprisingly also very windy on the train. We started on Shepard’s Bush Station on the Central line (red line) the and stayed on the train until Holborn where we were going to switch to the Piccadilly line (dark blue line) but when we just got off the train, when were about to switch lines, the intercom came on and announced: “Due to a problem with the escalators transfers to the Piccadilly line are no longer available.” Then the speaker crackled two times and the intercom was off. This wasn’t such a big problem as there were many other options to get to Kings Cross, but since we weren’t very sure of much as we didn’t live in London, it was a pretty big problem. (for us) Luckily though, there was a supervisor of the metro who offered to help. We looked at many solutions but we decided on the easiest solution, to go back two stops and then switch to the Victoria line (light blue line) after we get on the train we would only need to wait to arrive at King’s Cross. So, we waited about three minutes before the train arrived. We then followed the plan and ended up in the right place; Kings Cross. After we got to the King’s Cross station, we went straight underground from the metro to the train station, which was only about a three-minute trip straight from the metro train. The train station was huge! It had shopping places, restaurants, and cafes, it felt like the airport! I feel like America needs high-speed trains. And by America, I mean like where I live, Virginia. We were running out of time so we quickly rushed to buy tickets (we didn’t beforehand) one children’s ticket and two adult tickets because my grandparents decided that it was a long trip to get there and so they decided to just relax at the Airbnb and see the Westfield mall.

After we got to the King’s Cross station, we went straight underground from the metro to the train station, which was only about a three-minute trip straight from the metro train. The train station was huge! It had shopping places, restaurants, and cafes, it felt like the airport! I feel like America needs high-speed trains. And by America, I mean like where I live, Virginia. We were running out of time so we quickly rushed to buy tickets (we didn’t beforehand) one children’s ticket and two adult tickets because my grandparents decided that it was a long trip to get there and so they decided to just relax at the Airbnb and see the Westfield mall. Only about five minutes later the platform number was on the electronic screen and we were on our way to the train. The train was very full already when we just got onto it. Some people even stood on the sides, but luckily we found some seats. They were pretty much like the ones on the airplane, but some even had three face to face seats with a full-size table in the middle, but all of them were already taken as they were considered the “best seats”. But mostly we enjoyed the view and ate snacks. After about what felt like only an hour, the speakers came on and announced: “We are now arriving at our first stop, Cambridge.”

It took a while to get out of the train station and get on the bus. We took the bus to get to the downtown area of Cambridge, which took only about five minutes on the bus we were riding called the “Citibus” which was one of the many bus company’s in Cambridge. After looking at some historic buildings out the window, we arrived at the street in front of the famous Cambridge universities.

We first visited the square in front of the universities to take a few pictures before going punting. If you don’t know what punting is, punting is basically a way of boating, like kayaking. But unlike kayaking, punting uses a stick rather than a paddle. In order to punt you must let the rod drop until it hits the floor of the river/body of water and then push away from yourself. This makes the boat move forward. Punting definitely is harder than it looks and it takes a lot of energy too. Right when we were just about to go to the visitor center, someone came up to us with a clipboard and asked us if we would like to go punting with their company, but we were supposed to first go to the visitor center so we declined the offer and first went to the visitor center and got a brochure about punting and went to the place on the map that the person at the visitor center circled. It was the second punting place. So we went around to the 2^nd boating place to get on a boat. It took about five minutes to get there, but there wasn’t that many people there so we decided to head back to the 1^st boating place. After heading back, we found the 1^st person’s cousin who gave us the first offer and we headed to a store to buy some snacks and candy for the ride and went to the restrooms before boarding the boat. After a few minutes we came back to a crowd in front of the school and a guide. The guide explained that she would lead us to the boat. It took only a minute to get on the boat and then our trip began.

On the trip, we saw all the Universities including the all the bridges. We tore open snacks and ate them and took pictures. Most of the bridges required special fees to go on them besides one of the bridges which I think is the Cambridge bridge. We even saw the world’s second biggest chapel in the world! But after a while, we had to head back and we got a second chance at photos. Here are some of them:

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Then we hopped out of the boat and it was time to go to the Trinity college library aka the Wren library.

On our way we saw many graduation parties and ceremonies, there were ladies in dresses and men in suits and ties waiting in line to spectate the graduation. But when we were finally there I was amazed at the interior. The building had a giant field in the middle and contained many tall brown bricked buildings around it. I wasn’t sure if they were dorms or school teaching areas, but the buildings were extremely tall. When we were in line, we heard from the employee/teacher there that they even had the first volume of Winne the Pooh! I was really excited. After another bit of talking about the wren library, some people came out and we were handed laminated brochures and welcomed into the library. Even the stairs to the library were grand, they looked like light oak wood with a sophisticated design for the handle. The stairs were creaking but that was only because of the fact that the Wren library was completed in 1695! Then we came to the library doors.

The library wasn’t that huge, but it sure did contain a lot of books. In the back, they even had a huge stained glass portrait! There were many glass cases where we even saw some of Isaac Newton’s hair! If you don’t know Isaac Newton, He is the one who discovered gravity. There was always gravity but he basically came up with the concept. I saw a giant long painting that was almost six feet long! Then I finally found the first volume/edition of Winnie the Pooh! It wasn’t anything I imagined, it was a little chapter book with page numbers and everything a modern book has today. But I thought Winnie the Pooh would’ve been a picture book with bright colorful pictures, but back then it was a chapter book; a typical one a second or third grader might read today. After I read the two pages that were displayed I concluded that the characters were the same and pooh had the same personality, but it gave me more of a “This is more of a book series with occasional pictures”, rather than today’s “Oh, this is a little kid’s tv show”. It’s like Mickey mouse, it wasn’t meant to be like that, before it was comic, but now it is also a tv show for little children. We also saw an awesome sculpture of Aristotle. Here’s a quick biography of him for those who don’t know him: He was a famous Greek philosopher from a long time ago and he had the idea of the fact that everything went around the earth. But today we know that is not true.

But after about an hour it was time to leave. We went back to the square to find a place to eat and ended up at a pasta place. It was a long and fun day, but now it was time to leave for London. At the train station, we accidently boarded the wrong train and headed to a deserted train place here’s a picture:

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We got scared but then people started to come and we decided to board the next train to London. We were lucky it stopped and this time though we were on a slow train. We even confirmed with three different people five times to confirm that that train was headed for London.

It was a long and hectic day but we had fun! Here are some more random pictures of the trip:

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