Cambridge has changed a lot since I was a student there – more business, more gentrification, more tourists – but some things remain the same. The statue of Henry VIII over the great gate of Trinity College is still holding an orb and chair leg.

The tiles on the roof of the North West corner of First Court at St John’s college still show signs of wear.

That’s part of the unofficial and highly dangerous route up outside of the chapel tower.

In my first year at St John’s my rooms were E3 Third Court. That’s the two windows on the the right on the first floor (US: second floor).

The view has changed, but not much.

The trees have grown up a bit, the punts have grown fatter, and the border in front of New Court is quite a bit more floral.

However, as I noticed the last time I was in Cambridge seven years ago, an old friend was missing. There used be a giant sequoia growing by the corner of New Court. Here’s an old photo I took of it when I was a student. If you look closely you can see the damage to the bark around the base where the college sports teams used to punch it for luck before games.

So I was really happy to see when I walked by that spot today that there is a brand new sequoia growing there.

Cambridge colleges take the long view. The college will still be around when this sequoia reaches maturity.

Nice to see the college bars are still abusing licensing laws.

To be fair, the college has had a bar since long before there were licensing laws.

There is now also a floating bar on the river, where you can dock your punt for a Pimms or strawberries and cream.

Kings’ College has reached an uneasy truce with the Canada geese. They were doing what Canada geese do, which is breeding in large numbers and crapping on the paths. The college applied for permission to slaughter some of them. The students protested that they liked the geese. The college replied that the students weren’t the ones cleaning up the goose shit. A compromise was reached, and there is now a netting fence to keep the geese off the classy side of the river.

Each college has its own character. At Magdalene the students would have been shooting the geese themselves, and at Peterhouse the students wouldn’t care who shot them so long as they got to eat them afterwards. Or perhaps that has changed, too.

We are moored a few miles from Cambridge and took a train in today. The rail system is still in total chaos from a massive timetable change five weeks ago. Tomorrow we may be riding the bus.