Edinburgh

Our Experience in Edinburgh


We left beautiful Keswick and took the bus to Penrith where we would take the train and use our last day of the train pass to get to Edinburg. We had to change stations after about half an hour on the train, and later on after a few sudokus, we got to our final destination for the UK trip: Edinburgh.


We arrived to the station and went to find an ATM, we needed to cash out some more to pay the taxi to the hotel. We finally found the place where you take the taxi and there was a kilometric queue!! we had to wait quite a while until we got a taxi. As to be expected our first move was to go to the hotel to check in and leave the luggage.

We arrived at the location of our next hotel Pollock Halls. The accomodation office was very close and we did our check in. We went to the room and it was quite ok. It was very cloudy and rainy but we chose to go out anyways. It was still early and we could take the first look into the city. We took the bus and went downtown and there we walked through the famous Royal Mile.


We got to St Giles Cathedral and there we met a very friendly Visitor's Info worker. When we asked what we could do (since it was around 6 and everything was closed or closing) she recommended for us to take one of the Ghost Tours of the city. sounded interesting so we chose to wait until 8:00 pm to take the tour with Kara, from the City of the Dead tours.


We still had some time, so we headed to Saint James Shopping center which we realized it was still open. And being the way I am, when we came into the mall, there was this shop where you could get a "foot massage" in a very different way... with fish! After a while of trying to convince Tommi to take it with me (unsuccessfully) I went in and dipped my feet in the water. Odd isn't it?? It was very ticklish but in the end it was very nice, and my feet felt great!

So after a nice refreshing wait in the mall, we headed out again towards the High Street where we would meet with our tour. We met the tour guide Kara and we chat with her for a bit until all the people was ready to go. First she told us stories of the city and the old days, with a very funny humor that i guess is a characteristic of theirs. In any case we also made a small play where she demonstrated how a battle was carried out, and I got to be an involuntary .. well .. voluntary. I was an English soldier who was going to fight the "naked and blue painted Scottish" Oh well. We won :D


When the storytelling was more advanced, we started heading down the small alleys or "Closes" down towards the Bridges, where the vaults we would visit still existed. We finally got there and she started telling us about the horrible conditions that people had to live in those dark and damp rooms. It was quite odd that while we has telling us all these things, and telling us ghost stories, apparitions and under-worldly experiences people had had in these rooms, we could hear the great music of The Beatles ringing through the vaults, as apparently another vault nearby was now used as a disco and there was a wedding going on, Oh well.

The evening came to an end with a chilling story and some.. event I should say. From which I'm very proud I didn't flinch. We went back to the hotel and got ready to sleep. Sometime during the early morning we realized that the location of our room was not good. It was right in front of some kind of Uni office so the phones were ringing all the time. So yet again we went to complain about it since we still had 3 nights ahead of us in that hotel. We got changed again into the 3rd floor where everything was better :)


That day we had a nice big breakfast very much like the one in Cambridge. It was a very good start of the day and we headed out. The weather seemed to be nicer today and we tough we should start with the notorious Edinburgh Castle. but after a while of making a queue to buy the tickets we realized that there was an even bigger queue in front. We decided to go do something else, buy our tickets throught the internet and get them printed at the handy machine that no one seemed to be using.


With our new tactic, we took the City Sightseeing tour bus that went around the city. We heard more stories and descriptions of the places we saw. Sadly the Palace of Holyrood was closed due to the royal family being there. We later came to an area called Grassmarket where the tour suggested we go and eat. We got off and walked the plaza-like street where they used to hang people. We looked at some restaurants and we came across a French restaurant called Petit Paris. Very good food with very good prices. We loved it.


We continued our bus tour and came back to the station where we first took it, right in front of the castle, so we went to the next place called Camera Obscura a 5 floor building with tons of optical illusions, a mirror maze and what not. It was great fun, we went into a machine that showed pictures of how you would look if you were Asian, African, old, a baby, a monkey and even manga!


From the top of the building we had great views of the city and after we had a camera obscura show where we saw how it works and how they used it then. On our way out of the building we got a flyer advertising a true scottish music concert. Sounded interesting so we went to see it. It was really nice, the name was Stramash.

The evening ended and we went back to the hotel to get some sleep in our new room, we watched aliens 3 that was on the tv, and that was the end of our day. The next morning we woke up for the breakfast and headed to the computers to purchase our tickets to the castle and print our boarding passes for our flight the next day. And off we went to the Castle. We arrived and the queue was even longer than the day before! we were so glad we bought our tickets through the internet *hint hint*


We saw the castle and at the stoke of 1:00 pm we saw the cannon being fired. not of the old ones, a new one that was so loud it made the woman in front of me move and hit her head with my camera. Lol but i still got my shot in time to have the smoke. We continued our tour of the castle, and we noticed that the "waiting rooms" when you make the queue to see the Scottish crown jewels was way nicer than at the Tower of London. We also visited old prison cells and where the sailors used to sleep, very nice ambient there!

We finished our tour of The Castle of Edinburgh and we went to eat to a put back at the Grassmarket area. I thought I would have a small meal so I ordered a started which ended up being quite big; it had onion rings, wedges, chicken wings, nachos, sausage and garlic bread. Very good. And no, We can't remember the name of the pub, but its somewhere around there.


to finish our day, we wanted to take another ghost tour, because we only saw the vaults, we wanted to see the actual underground streets and we found out that the tour "The real Mary King's Close" was the one to take. So we went out to try to find the place. much to our disappointment, all the tours were booked and we could only get one until Monday (it was Saturday and we left the next day) So if anyone wants to take that tour, reserve in advance.


with nothing else to do and tired as we were. We chose to go to see a movie somewhere and rest for a while. We went to another area of the city where tourists seemed to have vanished, only we looked like tourists. Anyways we found the Theater with the help of some boys and arrived to Odeon (the movie theater) Sad to say they had very limited choices for things to watch, so we ended up watching Horrible Bosses. It was ok, but nothing too interesting. So the end of our evening came and we went back to the hotel and slept early after packing. We had a 4:00 am wake up call to leave to the airport. 


A few other people and we waited outside the School/Hotel  for taxis to pick us up. There was a girl from the USA waiting as well, and we offered to share the taxi, it would be cheaper for everyone! And while we waited, I noticed a dog walking... wait.. a Fox? Yes we saw a fox just walking around us, like 1 meter away. I told Tommi and we both looked at it. In return it looked back at us for a bit, and then realized that we were not approaching it or doing anything, so it just kept walking about. I was a bit shocked, I had never seen one in 'the wild' before and I found it to be quite careless. It left towards some trash cans and of course started making a mess.


Our trip ended with a last view of the city from the taxi that took us to the airport and we said goodbye to an amazing adventure in England. Thank you for the experiences and the Hospitality. We hope to visit again sometime. 


My Reviews

Accommodation

The "hotel" (Pollock Halls):
The campus was great looking with new buildings and old castle-like looking buildings too. This campus didn't offer free internet and you had to pay if you wanted to use the computers at the accommodation office, or if you wanted wireless. Apart from that it was very easily accessible with bus stops about one block away.


The room:
The first room we got was in front of an office of some kind and it was quite noisy in the morning. The bathroom smelled a bit bad, like a public toilet on the street, not too good. We got our room change to the third floor and although it was annoying passing the key card 3 times to get into the room (first on the building door, then for the elevator and then for the room) it was a better room than before. Sad to say, the toilet here also smelled about the same.


The included breakfast:
A very big buffet meal. It included things like hotcakes, bread, sausages, bacon, eggs, mushrooms, hash-browns, beans, fruit cereals and juices. Very good, no complains.

In the city

Stamp of approval:
Stramash: Great Scottish music for only 9£ (duration about 70 minutes) it was in a small church with good acoustics and the music was enchanting. They also projected pictures of Scotland and it was very nice. Totally worth it.
Petit Paris (Restaurant): Great food and prices. Its amazing what you can get once you get outside the common touristic places. You get more value for your money with good prices and great food. Also great service.
Camera Obscura: Great place to spend if you have the time. We spent about 3 to 4 hours in there. Time flies when you are having fun! its also a great place to take cool and fun pictures.


Stamp of disapproval:
Mary King's Close: Not having availability for walk-in clients is not good. If so many people is going, add a few more tour times. We were disappointed by not being able to go.

Keswick

Our Experience in Keswick

Beautiful houses in Keswick

First of all, we had a long trip ahead, we left Bath by train and had to change once at Bristol and then at Manchester, thankfully we didn't wait long for our connecting trains. We carried on and after a few hours we finally got to Penrith, the closest train stop before heading deeper into Lake District. It was a bit funny for us, that we had been listening to the name "Lake District" and imagining something like Finland, where millions of lakes are all around, but in Britain the Lake district only has 4 lakes. It was an amazing area non the less.

At Penrith we went to have some lunch at Jennings Agricultural Hotel which was near the station. We came in and had some delicious burgers while we caught up with the news we had been following throughout the trip: the horrible killings in Oslo, and the scandal of News of the World. We finished our meals and beer and we went back to the train station to figure what bus to take to get to Keswick. The bus trip was around 40 min to 1 hour. It felt long but the views were very nice, I think i slept for a bit on the bus (I always sleep during trips)

Finally we got to Keswick. We chose this destination for our trip very randomly. A friend from school (from York) recommended that we went to Keswick, that it was a very nice town. To my amazement, that was MY favorite place in the UK, at least from the places we visited.

The town was very compact and yet packed with beautiful looking homes. We noticed that most of the homes were actually Bed and Breakfast homes, and most of them had NO vacancy. The town was swarming with people, most of them looked like travelers, but brittish travelers, not so many foreigners like us. It seems that Keswick is a very good destination for camping and trekking. It was a bit late by then, so we went straight to our B&B to check in and drop the luggages. After checking in, we went out to take a look around the city and we went into the King's Arms to have a beer. It was so funny, there was a beer called Hobgoblin, it was so epic that i had to have one. It wasn't particularly good, but it gave me the right to say 'I've drunk hobgoblin beer'

We checked a map we had and saw that one of the lakes was not too far from the town, about 1 km or so, and we chose to give it a first look. We walked for a bit and through a very nice park, apparently donated by a rich woman, it was very colorful and full of flowers.

The evening slowly arrived while we were sitting on a field staring at the lake and its million inhabitants. There were many sheep, geese and ducks all around, and also some people enjoying the area as we were.
After chasing some sheep we called it a day and went back to the B&B where we watched some tv and went to sleep.

The next morning we woke up to have a very nice home made breakfast. As usual Robin was very nice and helpful and he pointed us to some walks we could do during the day. Sadly my back has been giving me problems ever since the hectic walking in Japan, so we opted for something that would be less demanding. I was eager to see the Castlerigg Stone Circle, so we chose a series of trails that would get us there and back in about two hours, or so we thought.

The hills and pathways looked amazing.

So we started our 'trekking' through the city. We began at the Moot Hall and went towards the old Train Station whose tracks are nowadays just a walking trail. We walked for a while, taking breaks for me to sit down often on along the way, and eventually we reached a road and began climbing a steep road. The road was long and very tiring for me, the inclination was weighting heavily on my back, i could feel it. But we found a way to make it work.

We finally reached the top and noticed that no other 'turist' was walking the 'path'. It was more like everyone DROVE up the hill. I felt cheated. But we came to a gate, went through it and up the final hill towards the Circle. It was quite nice and it had a very relaxed feeling to it. No tickets, no vendors, no nothing. It was just the people that got there, a few kids jumping up and down the stones (not too nice from my point of view) and other people having their picnics around. The pro was that it was very relaxed, we had a nice time there, but the con was that you couldn't really get a picture where no people was in it.

Castlerigg stone circle. More like a picnic area.

In any case the wind was very nice and fresh, but the sun was scorching. I ended up taking out our umbrella and using it to cover me from the sun. A few moments had passed and we took out the water we carried, some peanuts and ... wait a minute... whats that sound?? Oh! it was an ice-cream truck! Brilliant! we got some ice-cream and enjoyed it in the field beyond the circle. Very nice indeed.

After we recovered our strength, we carried on back towards town. We took a different route that took us further up some hills, later to come down some other trail with a great view of the lake.

Right of way, somewhere.

That afternoon we took a boat cruise around the lake. This boat company offered a service where we could get on and off at any of the 7 stops along the lake, but instead we chose the Evening Cruise that would go all around with some brief explanation of the places (and it also included a glass of wine) We found it very funny that as soon as everyone sat down on the boat, they gave us the wine. We would have expected to get it in the middle of the lake or on the way back.

The sun was still shining and we got very nice views of the area. We also got first row seats to the geese flying around and going towards that field where we viewed the sunset the day before. The rest of the evening we spent just walking about. We visited the nice park in the way to the town and later on we went to have a small diner and back to the B6B.

All the charms of a small town

For our last day, we wondered if to visit yet another museum or walk around aimlessly again. To tell the truth we were getting quite tired of walking all around. So when we saw a 'museum' that was for optical illusions, we didn't hesitate to spend our time there relaxing and with no rush to get anywhere.

After lots of fun and funny pictures in that place, at about midday, we went to eat to an Indian restaurant from whom we had gotten some coupons the day before. It was a very hidden place, and there wasn't many people in it, but the food was good, and the prices with the coupons was excellent.

Later on we went to the Cheese Shop where I finally found THE BEST CHEESE IN THE WORLD. (Lake District mature cheddar) I had tasted that cheese back in Tampere, once when a British Market had been set in the downtown square, and I absolutely loved it! We had been looking for for All of the trip and only in Keswick we found it. And because I love cheese, I bought 2 packs, but they didn't last long...

We also went to a small shop where we bought some toffee, postcards and some bread, cheese and ham for our late afternoon pick nick dinner, and we set out again to wander about the town.

Our trip to Keswick came to an end at the same park next to the lake. We had some bears and bread there and when we couldn't eat anymore, we fed the swarm of geese that was around there, some ducks too. It was quite fun, although a bit scary when they hissed at you so you would give them more.

My Reviews

Accommodation

The Bed and Breakfast (Ellergill):

Its right at downtown. You walk down the street and left on the corner and you are right in the center of town, great location. The owners Robin and Clare are very nice people and love hinting you about where you could go for great walks! The house is lovely and the street is full of houses that look similar, they all look gorgeous.

The room:

I have to say it was the best room we had. Very nicely kept, with a look from the window towards other story-like roofs, lovely. The room had en-suite and it looked overall quite nice. Tv included!

The included breakfast:

Every day we filled in a card saying what we wanted from the meals they offered. My choice was fried eggs with sausage, mushrooms and tomato, with some toasted bread on the side and fruit tea. They also had yogurts and other similar British breakfasts. 

In the city

Stamp of approval:

The Castlerigg Stone Circle walk: Walking to Castlerigg (a stone circle, kind of like Stonehenge) was at first a bit difficult for me. It was all the way up a large hill through some streets. But on the way down, we came through another path that took us through a stream, some sheep fields and a beautiful view of the lake. Fantastic.
Fairtrade: It was very nice to see that most of the things around the city are Fairtrade. That's a good touch to anything.
Shopping: I don't know about where you live, but here in Finland clothes are very expensive. Many shops had great discounts and we bought some very good stuff for very good prices.

Stamp of disapproval:

'Time to close': It was a bit discouraging that whenever we wanted to have dinner... most restaurants were closed. I don't know whats the regular time for British people to go have dinner, but it seemed to be quite early to what I'm used to. Sometime we had very limited choices for meals because of this.

Bath

Our Experience in Bath

As the trip slips further and further away from my mind, I find it increasingly hard to remember every single detail from the trip. It tells me that I should write as soon as I return from the trip and not wait until after many months to write.

In any case, Bath was an amazing city, we approached by train and started to see all the picturesque scenes that looked right out of a postcard. The train station is located on the south part of the city in the downtown area. All the special places can be walked to, if you feel like walking.

Bath and Beautiful

One of the places we visited, after checking in at the University's "hotel room", was the Bath abbey where we were toured around on the upper levels and through a series of winding up stairs. We went to the bell rooms where they showed us how they managed to play the tunes with the bells when the time is right. It all started with one man for each bell, but apparently they had troubles with keeping the men sober so they could go at night and ring the bells. Eventually they changed into an electronic system that plays the tunes now.

From inside the Abbey

The trip up and down the 212 steps was a bit tiring at times, but it was way worth the effort. We got great views of the city at the top of the Abbey and also caught a glimpse of the Roman Baths (we didn't visit them because the queue was kilometric)

Jimmy Spice restaurant, great buffet!

Afte the exercise we wanted a nice meal to recover our strength. We found a great buffet place called Jimmy Spice, it had great Italian, Indian, Thai and i don't remember what other kind of food, but it was amazing. If you are hungry and cant think of what to eat, this buffet is for you! (No, I don't get paid to advertise it)

Later on we went around to walk around the city. There are some walkways next to the river that offer great views and also some places to sit down and have some snacks and a drink.

Bath, great city

From the picture above, you can see the bridge and on the right side, below the building, there is a small pathway and some stairs. There is a cafe & restaurant called Riverside. We had a cup of wine and some great snacks from there with the view of the river.

The next day we went to visit Jane Austen house where I bought my copy of Sense and Sensibility. I love the movie but i guess i needed something to read in the long train trips and why not something I wanted? I have to say that sometimes the language was a bit confusing, but it always happens with old books and writers.

We also walked to the "The circus" roundabout that was just a few meters away and then we went to the Assembly rooms. Bad idea, we didn't like the place, it was very lacking. The rooms were completely empty and it looked just like any other big hall for modern day parties and weddings. Nothing impressive and we thought that what we saw was very lacking in relation to the admission ticket price.

We then went to have lunch at the Loch Fyne Restaurant. I have to say that it was a great restaurant. I really really fancied some scallops and the restaurant had some as an entry, I asked If there was a way they could prepare some for me as a meal and they agreed and made a new dish just for me. It was great by the way, I was very happy with the flexibility of the restaurant and the quality and taste of the meal.

After our nice meal we went down to the downtown part of the city again, we went first through the Royal Crescent (that was about the same height as we were from the restaurant) and then headed downwards towards the city. When we reached downtown, we went to a park called Parade Gardens, we paid a small maintenance fee to enter and look at the beautiful garden. They had a lot of beach-like chairs for people to rest at, some benches around the park and an ice-cream shop.

Rivers and Gardens

There were many interesting 'plant sculptures' around the park. A lot of work and dedication was poured into this place and the end result was a fantastic experience.

The Park of Bath

On the sad note, it was really bad to see how many people have zero consideration for others and zero regard for RULES. there was a rule about not climbing trees, and there were some kids,of course, doing it, and the parents taking picture... *sigh* insane, and very annoying. Also the same family later on was playing with some balls, and there was also a rule about NOT playing with balls. Anyways after getting quite annoyed at those people, we continued our journey.

The next day we visited the Thermae Bath Spa. A spa with many things to do and experience. There was pool at the top of the building on the roof, so you had the great view of the city while enjoying the comfort of the thermal water pool and the hydro massage spots around the pool. The place took me back to my childhood by looking at all the roofs and Mary-Poppins looking chimneys. Inside the building there was another pool and also a room with saunas. I'm not too fan of saunas but it was interesting there because they had 4 rooms with different 'scented' saunas. It somehow gave you a sense of healthiness, hehe.

Another place we visited, once we had seen most of the city and almost like a closure to our visit to Bath, was the Little Theatre. A small movie theater close to the Thermae Bath Spa.

Little Theatre where we saw Tree of Life

The theater was very small and cozy, yet it had comfortable seats and very friendly staff. They didn't take credit or debit cards so cash out before you go there. Inside it was decorated very old-school, the projection area for the movies even had the famous red curtain and all. It was like a trip back in time! to a time i hadn't been born probably... but nice! :D

We saw the movie Tree of Life and I'm sad to admit we didn't like it much. It was very bizarre mixure of reality versus surreal, If i'm allowed to describe it like that. It was the first time that I saw people leaving the theater, 3 couples left before the movie was finished, and I compleately understand why they did it.

In conclusion, Bath is a great city that needs to be visited. You will enjoy it :)

My Reviews

Accommodation

The Hotel. University of Bath, Woodland Court:

At first it was a bit confusing because there are two Accommodation service centers in the campus, and of course we went to the wrong one. After being redirected we found the Woodland court. very nice area with a lobby with free internet access through the computers there, you only needed to pay a small deposit fee for the card to access the computer and upon returning the card, you got your money back. Excellent service there. 

The room:

The room was spacious and the bathroom was very good too. It was very modern/university-like. There was a kitchen nearby where we could store food in the fridge or heat up a meal. On a funny note, you need to pass the key in order to lock the door of the room, Don't forget to do it!

The breakfast:

Sadly this place didn't include a breakfast, but it was easy to buy something at a Sainsbury and store in the uni for later use.

No tv:

There was a computer screen which we thought was a tv. It was one of those tv/computer screens but with no antenna. Naturally we tried everything to make it work and we went to see if in the lobby they could change the cable or do something about it. They said there were no Tv's in the rooms and they couldn't do much about it. On the bright side, there was a Common room just across the hallway and there we could watch tv. There were very few people in the area, so the tv was all for ourselves.

In the city

Stamp of approval:

Buses: From the university we only needed to take a bus to get downtown. We had two choices and both had a ticket that you could buy the return ticket as well and it was cheaper. Great for us!

Stamp of disapproval:

Roman Baths: It looked like a great place to visit, we saw it from above and it was quite nice, BUT there was a very, very long queue and we chose not to go. We were not going to spend 2 hours queuing for it.
Assembly rooms: We thought this would be a great place, we paid the entry fee and it was a complete disappointment. One of the very few rooms (and by very few I mean 4) was closed and the rest were just, empty rooms really. I expected some kind of setting so we could see how they were used before. Not worth it and totally Not recommended. 

Cambridge

Our Experience in Cambridge

The first place that we visited in the UK was Cambridge. We flew to London and we took a National Express bus to Cambridge. The first thing I noticed while looking out through the window of the coach was rabbits all over the fields around the airport. While attempting for Tommi (my husband) to see them (unsuccessfully), I also noticed a few deer walking about. Very interesting start.

So, after about two hours we got to Cambridge. It was late in the afternoon but there was still time to go around the city after dropping our luggage at the hotel. We actually stayed at the Churchill College where we had a quite nicely sized room.

We walked downtown for a few minutes and we took a glance at one of the most famous attractions: punting.
We had booked in advance our seats, so the next day we would take the tour through the river. We went to find a nice place to have dinner and we found that our destination: The Clown (as recommended by Lonely planet guide) was actually not that good looking. We chose to find another place to eat and we landed at The Eagle pub where we had a great time, good beers and good food. Definitely worth going there.

After a nice after-dark walk through the city we walked back to the Churchill college and had a very nice good night sleep.

The next morning we had one of the best breakfasts of our trip (second best to be precise) and went downtown. My back seems to be a problem so every now and then we needed to stop and rest for a bit before continuing. One of the "resting places" we chose was Benets coffee shop. nice place with home made ice cream and great looking crepes. We didn't try any tough just a coffee for my husband.

At 12:00 we had our punting appointment and we met with the company guy in front of St. Mary's church. On a side note, it was funny to learn the guy was also Finnish. The punting was great and it seemed to be very popular, even among the geese.

After a few stories about the city and great views, our tour ended and we headed back to "shore" It was time for a nice meal and indeed we found a great place. I say its the BEST place we ate in the whole trip. It was an Indian restaurant whose name I'm very sad to say that I don't remember :( But in any case the food was great and here is a picture of the dishes we had.

While we were eating, the sky chose to give a nice shower to the city. It rained quite hard and for the duration of our meal luckily so we continued out exploring the city with very little use of our newly acquired umbrella.

I have to say one of the Greatest things we witnessed while walking in the city was a beggar. Yes, you heard me someone at the streets asking for money. But it was the way he did it that caught our attention. He was brilliant. So he got a few coins for his ingeniousness. We were walking  south on Bridge Street and while looking around we started hearing music coming from the street a guitar and some singing.. but where was the musician? I looked around and I tried pinpointing the location of the sound. i looked across the street and there he was... i could see the hand and arm of the guitar player.. and the arm of the guitar itself, but.. where was the rest of his body? Oh that's right! this is where his genius brain tough of. INSIDE A TRASHCAN! This man somehow got himself Into the trashcan, WITH his guitar, and started playing from it. On the downside, if someone was to steal his shirt full of money on the outside, he wouldn't be able to catch them... So, this is how he looked like, and yeah, that's me after dropping a few coins :D

So our day at Cambridge was coming to an end and we went to pick up our luggage from the college. we went to the "bus station" which was basically just a street where the buses parked in front of Parker's Piece park and we waited for the next bus. Sadly the guy from National Express told us it would be difficult to get tickets to London since most of them were sold out. He told us we could wait and see if a few places were not taken when the bus came. so we waited for around an hour to see if the next bus could accommodate us. lucky for us, it could, so we took our seats and headed for London.


My Reviews

Accomodation

The "hotel" (Churchill College):
http://www.cambridgerooms.co.uk/colleges/churchill.aspx
Very nice play to stay, very good sized room with en-suite bathroom, included breakfast, nice big area, and close to downtown. Oh yes, good price too.

The room:
For a married couple, it was weird having two individual sized beds (and by individual I mean very narrow). The room itself was very long and had an en-suite bathroom. Its weird to admit that we had a lot of trouble finding the switch to turn on the light in the bathroom! it was actually not inside the bathroom, it was outside, but far away from the door. Funny remark. Oh did I mentioned? We had a piano in the room! how weird!

The included breakfast:
Great start of a trip with a marvelous big breakfast! It was a buffet menu with eggs, fruits, sausages, potatoes, tomatoes, croissants, mushrooms, overall very nice. I had low expectations of British food from my brother's told experiences and I was more than glad to be proven differently.


No tv:
Sadly for us. There was no TV in the room. But to our advantage, the college was close to downtown and we only paid about 6£ for a taxi if we needed one. We basically just walked there.

In the city

Stamp of approval:

The Eagle: A pub downtown. Great food and with good prices. It also has a great feeling of the very old medieval pub/inn.

Punting: we took the punting tour  (which is basically a long wooden boat "rowed" by a person with a long pole. We took this particular company http://www.thecambridgepuntingcompany.co.uk/ . We found it very handy because we could book it online and pay through the internet. We had our 12:00 appointment booked so we had no problems with tours being full. 

Stamp of disapproval:
The Clown: Although it was listed in the Lonely Planet guide as a very recommended place with great food. we found the food to have been sitting there for a long time. We didn't eat there since the food didn't look good. another indication was the emptiness of the restaurant. If it is empty... there's a reason. So we moved to the next place.