Punting in Cambridge

On the weekend, we stayed in a village near Cambridge with our friends Malcolm and Esther and their sons Pablo and Mario. Here's an interview with J, F and B about our punting adventure in Cambridge on Saturday with Malcolm and Pablo!

What is a punt?

F: A punt is a rectangular boat that's hollowed out, with boards along the floor, so you're sitting on the boards but there's water directly below you. On the back of the boat there's a flat thing, just wide enough for an adult to stand reasonably on, with no things to stop them falling off. The person stands on that with an extremely, extremely long metal pole, and lifts up that pole, juts it into the riverbed, and uses that to push the punt along.

What happened when we first got there?

F: The employees of the punting business kept trying to get themselves to do it because they were very worried about Pablo's capabilities. So we switched to Malcolm.

Why were they worried about Pablo's (and Malcolm's) capabilities?

B: Because of all the heavy rain that England has been having, there has been lots of flooding. This has led to the river being very high and the current being much stronger than usual. We noticed that some of the guided punts had two people punting, which Malcolm had never seen before.

How did you feel when you first got into the punt?

J: Terrified. Totally terrified because the boat was like half under water, just without any water in the actual boat. Technically.

What was it like?

F: Extremely scary. The boat was wibblin' and wobblin' and the water was just like half a foot below the edge of the punt. There wasn't a lot of boat separating us from the water and it was very scary because the water was wet and cold.

J: And also, whenever the boat tipped, which it did about every half a minute, the water went like a centimetre or less below the top edge of the boat.

What did we see while punting?

F: Ducks. Quite a lot of ducks.

J: Also, I saw a bottle cork. Not that a cork is an animal. I also saw a squirrel.

F: Oh, I remember that. I also remember seeing some gooses. Not geese — gooses. (They are actually still the same animal, but I just call them gooses.)

Anything else?

B: We saw the famous Mathematical Bridge. Also the Bridge of Sighs, version 2 (note version 1 in Venice; version 3 in Oxford), as well as a few other bridges. And the backs of the famous Trinity College and King's College Cambridge. And some lovely parks.

J: I also saw bridges. Lots of bridges. There was also a pub set up on the river. Not like a big building — an actual punt with a bar on it with lots of drinks.

F: They sailed past you and asked if you wanted a drink.

Did you hear any interesting stories?

F: Yes. While we were sailing past a tour group, we heard a story about King's College. Some students, who had to be very fit and very mischievous, climbed up the tallest tower on the building and put a cone there. The builders couldn't reach the cone normally — I don't know how the students put it there — so they had to build a bunch of scaffolding just to get up there, which took them a few days. And the day before they were about to get the scaffolding up to the cone, the kids climbed up there and put the cone on the other tower. Oh, and another time some students put their principal's car on top of the school roof. Somehow.

B: They used a makeshift crane.

What was Malcolm doing?

J: He was the punter, where he dipped the big giant metal pole into the water, touched the riverbank and pushed off the riverbank using the pole, and made the boat go speeding off.

Was he working hard?

J: Yes. He was working very hard.

B: Pablo was also working very hard, paddling at the front of the punt to help steer and overcome the current.

How did you feel by the end?

J: Relieved. Totally relieved.

F: Relieved.