Quaint & Simple: Date Day

As you know, Brian and I live near Cornell University. Cornell's a big, prestigious school, but what really impresses me about Cornell is their campus. It is beautiful.

This isn't the best view, but the campus is beautiful.

Here are some other pictures of campus:

The majority of buildings are old-fashioned and beautiful, draped in vines (hence "ivy-league"). In fact, my brother worked construction on Cornell campus several years ago, and he says that they go through great pains to keep the vines intact when doing work on the walls beneath them. It's worth it, whatever the cost, because the campus is just gorgeous.

Every once in a while, Brian and I will do a date day at Cornell to take pictures and stew around the old, beautiful buildings.

This last time, we first went to the "Carriage House Cafe". It's the cutest little cafe, and we've wanted to go for a while, so went for a little brunch.

Isn't it cute? It was filled with college students, and the inside was just as eclectic as I expected.

Pardon the horrible picture-taking. I really should have Brian take all of the pictures, but I leave him to do the real photography, so we're stuck with me. The place was an interesting mix of mission-style, old country (stone walls), and other stuff. There were french posters on the wall and old vintage things all around. It actually worked well.

Before we move on, I have to make a quick note of the people in the photo above. I mostly took this picture to get them in. The table in the center of the picture is what I'm talking about. Now these Cornell students are exactly what I picture when I think of the school (and wealthy college kids at any school for that matter). They guys at the table were wearing (from right to left) a white shorts with a white long-sleeved polo (collar popped of course) with boat shoes; jeans with loafers, a blue buttoned-down shirt and a suit jacket; slacks with loafers, a pink buttoned down shirt under a purple v-neck sweater. Haha! I just about died. I felt like I was in the movies.

Anyway the food was expensive so we didn't order much, but it was good.

The drink was especially amazing. It's called a "steamer". Basically steamed milk with syrups and froth. This was a cinnamon steamer. It was yummy.

Anyway, back to Cornell. Brian took lots of pictures of campus:

He lays right down in the flower beds to take pictures. I don't have any copies of his pictures, but they were good. Here's an example of what he was taking, but by me so it stinks.

Our favorite thing to do at Cornell is go to the bell tower. The building above the flowers in the pictures above is the Cornell Clock Tower. At the top is a bell organ, and several times daily they have concerts. You have to climb several flights of stairs to get to the top.

The actual organ is located just below the bells.

You can climb another flight of stairs and actually stand by the bells. It's a beautiful view (see the fist picture in this post).

It's SUPER loud up there while the bells are going. I thought of taking a video, but I don't think it'd be able to capture the clanging.

Here's a video of the bell organ. It's like a normal organ, but each key is for a hand; not a finger. Check it out:

Sorry I filmed it sideways, but you get the idea. They finish every concert with the Cornell Alma Mater (sp?):

Pretty cool huh?! I love to go.

After that we went and spent some time on the "slope". It's a very steep slope that they keep natural all year. It's got a beautiful view of lower campus and of the lake.

This is one of my favorite buildings on campus. It's just dorms, but that walkway between the buildings is incredibly ornate and beautiful:

It's a calming place to be, so we just chilled for a while.

After Cornell we down to the Commons and stewed around.

They have live music there a lot, but we didn't particularly like what was playing that day, so we decided to hike Cascadilla. This is a gorge that goes from downtown Ithaca up to Cornell campus. Part of it is under construction right now, but usually the students use it to go to campus (what a wonderful daily walk that would be).