This is a little taster in case you cannot get to see it. The whale bones are from a minkie whale washed up some years ago on the norfolk coast.

 

Then we ambled around for a bit, passing the Sedgewick museum which was a little bit of a memory lane for me, and taking in the pretty streets and this and that until we came across a poster for an exhibition that looked intriguing. That one poster took us to another and another through a building site, and, still following posters, to the school of zoology and a most beautiful, thought provoking exhibition. I can't describe it, all I can say is if you are in, or near, Cambridge get along to see it because it is out of the ordinary and really very moving. I haven't stopped thinking about it since. http://www.conflictedseeds.com/conflicted-seeds-spirit/

    

After the Heong Gallery and a brief look at Downing College we had time to hang out and catch up with each other and Susan very agreeably allowed me to get us lost-ish as we half-aimed for the Fitzwilliam Museum. First we went up a dead end street and discovered Hobson House which used to be a fire station and a mortuary we were told by a random man that we got chatting to. We'd been drawn in by the glass roof and as we went in we also noticed a tower of stained glass surrounded by scaffolding which the same man said housed a staircase.

And seven doors on arriving in Cambridge. 

My photos are going to backtrack a little now as I took them as a kind of story so I will return to Norwich and Prince of Wales road - it's pretty morning face - and last night's rain on a bus shelter and the sunlit station.

 

An outsider's view. 

A few days ago I took a trip to Cambridge to meet up with a friend I met when I was part of the local open studios event in 2014. Our meeting then was one of those moments, I'd had a rush of people just before she arrived and I had just hit a quiet moment which felt like quite a relief when there was a knock at the door, and she walked in and within an instant I think we both knew we had met a friend. We have been in touch ever since and I have mentioned her previously in my blog as she is a fountain of inspiration. 
Up to this week our encounters have always been in Norwich but Susan doesn't live in Norwich and Cambridge is about halfway between us so it seemed like a good place to meet, particularly as there was an exhibition I had read about in someone else's blog that I thought might be interesting to both of us. 
The exhibition was at the newly opened Heong Gallery connected to Downing College. I was attracted because the images I'd seen suggested that it would be full of colour. When we arrived, after meeting at the station and stopping briefly at a charity shop on the way, we were a bit amazed at the magnificence of the college. The history of it's beginning is quite interesting so here's a wiki-link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downing_College,_Cambridge. and for Susan I'm going to mention that Quentin Blake and David Lister are two of it's celebrated alumni.
The exhibition was perhaps different to how I had imagined but not disappointing. It is always interesting to see work in body rather than reproduced in a book or as an image on a computer screen. To be able to get up close and see cracks and daubs of paint and to feel a paintings heart beat, to register the size and texture, and note how or if it is framed. 
I loved the Peter Lanyon and Roger Hilton paintings and also the personal letters and christmas cards in the case by the door. It's an exhibition that is worth a look. http://www.dow.cam.ac.uk/index.php/about/news/471-gallery and the college has a grandeur that is gorgeous if also a little shocking.