Punting on the Cam

The cliche for Cambridge is punting. I had to look after a class for a teacher who was ill, and the lesson was a trip in punts. We took them into the city and to the boatyard, where a "touter", or should that be "punter"? gave us a price for our 28 students, reduced it and handed us a written quote which was higher than what we had told the students: £6 each for three punts full instead of the £4.50 we'd previously understood. The kids had started handing over the cash to us when the manager said he couldn't do it for that, only two punts and four of the students would have to punt themselves instead of being punted. There were protests; I think all the boys wanted to do it!
I sat in the front (stern) of a big punt and handed out the slices of stale bread for the students to feed to the ducks.
My goodness there were a lot of punts on the river! In some places there were real traffic jams where amateurs were drifting across and bumping into others. The professionals just glided peacefully through the chaos making it look very easy.
It's a nice guided tour, past the pretty sides of the colleges and their gardens. We were told little snippets of history and tradition, and we threw bread for the ducks who came rushing towards us as if they were starving! On our return we saw the boys who were punting themselves struggling along with all the mess of punts near the boatyard; they'd had a great time, but not got very far.