Punting

Last week, a few of my classmates and I decided to take a break from studying for exams to go punting. Punting, pushing a flat-bottomed boat along a shallow river with a pole, is an age old tradition at Oxford and you can't really say you've lived in Oxford unless you've spent some time flailing around in a punt.

"Punting is not as easy as it looks. As in rowing, you soon learn how to get along and handle the craft, but it takes long practice before you can do this with dignity and without getting the water all up your sleeve."

– Jerome K. Jerome, Three Men in a Boat (1889)

Well, contrary to what Jerome K. Jerome's characters set out to do in his boat, we had no intention of doing with dignity. We donned what I thought was my finest punting attire, went to M&S to load up on picnic snacks, and bought the mandatory bottle of Pimm's.






Of course being in England, the nice sunny weather quickly turned to stormy rainfall but we didn't let that deter us...