Walking the Backs: Cambridge's Colleges from the River

The Backs are not one thing you buy a ticket to. They are the shared name for the gardens, lawns and bridges that six colleges, Magdalene, St John's, Trinity, Trinity Hall, Clare and King's, keep along the western bank of the Cam, and the only way to see the whole run in one go is on foot along Queen's Road, which is free, or from a punt on the river, which is not. This is the free route, and where to spend money if you want to.

Start at Magdalene Bridge

Begin at Magdalene Bridge, where Bridge Street crosses the Cam at the northern end of the historic centre. Magdalene College sits on the far bank; Quayside, one of the two punt stations, is right beside the bridge, so this is also where you would start a trip on the water instead. Head south along Queen's Road, which runs parallel to the river a short distance back from the bank for most of its length, with gaps and gates giving glimpses through to the water and the college buildings beyond.

St John's and the Bridge of Sighs

The first proper landmark is St John's College, whose covered Bridge of Sighs, built in 1831 and named after its Venetian counterpart rather than resembling it especially closely, crosses the Cam between the college's older and newer courts. You cannot walk across it without being a member of the college, but it is clearly visible from the public bridge just south, and from the river if you are punting. St John's own grounds, including the New Court often called the Wedding Cake for its tiered Gothic Revival facade, are open to paying visitors on their usual hours.

Trinity and Clare

South of St John's, Trinity College's grounds run down to the river with Wren's Nevile's Court library visible from the water side, and Trinity Bridge crossing to the college's own Backs lawn, which is generally not open to the public even when the rest of the college is. Clare College follows immediately after, and Clare Bridge, built in 1640, is the oldest surviving bridge on the river. Clare's own garden, on the far bank, is genuinely worth the separate admission if you have time: it is planted for continuous colour through the growing season and gives a close-up version of the view you have otherwise only seen from a distance.

King's: the view everyone comes for

Continue south and King's College Chapel comes into view properly for the first time, its west end and the long run of the chapel's flank facing the river across King's own Backs lawn. This is the single most photographed stretch of the whole walk, and for good reason: the chapel's fan vaulting is invisible from outside, but its sheer scale against the flat lawn and the river is the picture most people have in their head before they ever arrive in Cambridge. King's College Chapel itself, entered from King's Parade on the town side, is a separate ticketed visit, covered in its own listing.

Queens' and the Mathematical Bridge

The walk finishes, or nearly finishes, at Queens' College and the Mathematical Bridge, a wooden bridge built in 1749 whose engineering (a lattice of straight timbers forming a curve) has generated a persistent myth that it was originally built without nails or bolts and later taken apart and reassembled incorrectly by curious students. It was not; the current bridge, like its predecessors, has always used metal fixings. It remains one of the best-photographed bridges on the river regardless. Silver Street bridge, immediately south, is where Queen's Road ends and where the second Scudamore's punt station, Mill Lane, operates.

Doing it from the water instead

Everything described above can also be seen from a punt, poled either by a Scudamore's chauffeur or by yourself if you hire a punt at Mill Lane or Quayside. The river gives you the reverse angle, looking up at the colleges from water level rather than along the bank, and it is genuinely a different experience rather than a redundant one; most people who love Cambridge end up doing both the walk and the punt on separate visits or the same day.

Timing

Early morning, before nine in summer, is the quietest window for the walk itself and the best light on King's College Chapel, which faces roughly east. Queen's Road is open at all reasonable hours since it is a public road rather than college property, though the college gardens that open off it keep their own separate hours and mostly close in the evening.