I stayed a couple of nights with Sam and Karen, wonderful generous people. And Mr Tims the cat. It was good to catch up with Sam, who I used to work with some years ago.
Sam showed me some of her beautiful town, but then I sent her home as she wasn't well.
I'm not entirely sure what makes this town so enchanting, but there were a number of moments where I felt as if I was in a movie scene, something quite surreal. I was trying to pick the 'actors' from the tourists, and there were a lot of tourists. It was easy enough to spot the classic professor types on cycles, and student types in the pub, though.
I also loved that the colleges and chapels had forboding exteriors but glimpses through decorative wrought iron gates showed something else. Like promises of something lovely enough to keep secret. A secret garden, perhaps?
I was lucky enough to slip throuh the heavy wooden doors of the Gonville and Caius Chapel before they removed the 'visitors welcome' sign.
Naked vines were clinging to the stone walls. Decorative lights, door carvings, pebbled paths, a tree fern one corner. All shimmering in the fragile sunlight, enjoying it's brief moment of warmth.
This was my stolen moment, something to be treasured and remembered, because all too soon the sun slipped behind another cloud, the chill returned to the air, and the magic was gone.