Gate of honour

The nice thing about having visitors - apart from their company of course - is that you see the place in which you live through their eyes.  Even somewhere as extraordinary as Cambridge is easy to take for granted when you see it every day.

We walked across Jesus Green and along Trinity Street and, as it was open to visitors, we popped into Gonville and Caius (pronounced 'keys') College - through the Gate of Humility, past the avenue of trees in Tree Court, through the Gate of Virtue into Caius Court.

At the south side of Caius Court is the Elizabethan Gate of Honour, designed by Dr Caius, who had studied in Padua under Vesalius and who had been physician to both Edward VI and Mary.  The gate was built to his design (but after his death) in 1575.

Nicholas Pevsner is very snooty about this gate, but it is one of my favourite buildings - if it actually counts as a building - in Cambridge.   Graduating students pass through it on the way to get their degrees from the Senate House opposite.

Ghostly infestation

An avenue of trees on Jesus Green has been taken over by caterpillars - caterpillars of the ermine moth. This is the second time this has happened, although this year it is even more extensive.  A couple of the trees did not fully recover from last year's attack and given that the caterpillars have stripped every tree of every leaf, it will be interesting to see if the trees can survive.

It is a weird sight, with the trees looking as though they have been in a sharp frost.  There is a ghostly white bloom to the branches and trunks with the webs extending out across the grass.  There are countless caterpillars, some in great knots beneath the (surprisingly tough) silk blanket, whilst others rush up and down the tree trunks.  Given that it is spring and the area is full of nesting birds, the caterpillars must taste particularly bad for them to be so ignored.