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May 12, 2007

Tour Of Trinity

Finally, it's here! The Tour Of Trinity! As requested, I prepared a photographic tour of Trinity College for all my faithful readers who wonder where it is I go to school. First, a little background. Trinity College was founded in 1823 in Hartford, CT at the current site of the Connecticut Capitol Building:

Personally, I think they should have left it here rather than moving us to Frog Hollow which, despite the photos on the site I just linked making it look cute, is anything but.

If you want to know any random facts about Trinity, here's Wikipedia's list of Trinity College trivia. My favorite, of course, being:

The male character Cassidy in the famous opening sequence of Jaws (film) was a caricature of the stereotypical Trinity student. The College received its greatest mass media plug in the scene where Cassidy says, "Na, Hartford, I go to Trinity. My folks live in Greenwich."

That's me!

Anyway, you can do your Trinity College research there if you have any interest, but now it's time for the photographic tour.

Here's a map of Trinity's campus for reference.

On the north side of campus we have Vernon St., home to many of Trinity's frats along with the dorm that Brent and I will be living in next year (the best one on campus, of course).

Vernon St.:

Starting at the top of the Vernon St. hill is St. Anthony's Hall or just "The Hall" as we call it. They live in their own special dorm hidden behind these trees:

Their "party house" is an old castle right behind their dorm:

This part of campus is actually called Gallows Hill (despite the Gallows Hill student lounge being on the other side of campus). Gallows Hill is where, during the American Revolution, loyalists were hanged.

A little farther down is Vernon Place, the school's "social center" for school-sponsored parties with the best senior dorm on campus upstairs:

Across the street from Vernon Place is the English building, where all of the school's English classes are held:

Next to the English building is The Bistro, the best dining option on campus:

Next to The Bistro is the admissions building:

The back of the admissions building:

The walkway between The Bistro, the English building, and some other stuff:

A great knotted tree:

Continuing down on Vernon St. is Psi U, another of my favorite frats. The picture is taken in the dark because that's when I tend to see it:

Vernon St. has other frats and dorms but for The Blonde Excuse, this completes the segment on Vernon St.

Moving south across campus, we see the archway that leads from the admissions building area to the main quad of campus:

Through this arch is the main quad with the Long Walk and Lower Long Walk which run parallel on either side of the country's largest unbroken quad on any college campus! This is when it's going to get a little confusing because I'm trying to move north to south, but because there are parallel "long walks" I'm going to have to jump between the two a little bit.

Before anything else, Trinity's chapel is actually right next to this arch, so it's not really on one side or the other. The Trinity Chapel is absolutely gorgeous inside and out so I have a ton of pictures of the chapel and the chapel courtyard.

Trinity has a lot of beautiful magnolia trees like this one, right next to the chapel:

The magnolia I just pictured is on the right, and this is a view of the chapel from the Lower Long Walk. I love the little wooden doors all around the chapel (there are at least three and we have no idea what they lead to):

Back on the other side of the chapel (right near the arch on the quad side) is this beautiful walkway right near the courtyard:

Looking through to a different pink, flowering tree:

The outside of another similar walkway:

Little balcony looking over the courtyard:

The courtyard:

The constipated face on the wall:

The creepy face on the wall:

There are faces coming out of walls all over campus, but I think these two are my favorites.

I'm not sure what this is, but the numbers make me think it's some sort of weird sundial or something:

Leaving the chapel and walking across the quad, this is the view of The Hall's castle between the arch and the chapel:

Back on the Lower Long Walk, here's another angle of the chapel:

Lower Long Walk (facing north):

Facing the chapel from this angle, to the right of Lower Long Walk (east, I guess) are the sports fields:

The Bantam (our mascot):

Another random fact, Trinity's football team has the longest winning streak of any college in America.

This is a picture of the main building of Trinity which is along the Long Walk (picture taken from the Lower Long Walk):

This building has classrooms and dorms (and it's where Brent and I lived Freshman year).

Another picture of it, taken from closer to the chapel:

It's L-shaped and this is the other part of it, facing toward the chapel across the quad (the other part facing Lower Long Walk across the quad):

Looking across the quad:

Right next to this part of the building is Cinestudio, Trinity's movie theater, which is attached to the chemistry building:


Cinestudio shows a wide variety of foreign, art, classic, and even "right out of theaters" films and is one of my favorite places on campus. The theater itself is really old and even has balcony seating! If you're ever in Hartford, definitely go see a movie at Cinestudio.

Now for some pictures of the quad itself. First of all, the trees that you see there are elms and they're spaced out to make a giant "T." In the middle is a statue of some guy... I should know this but I don't remember:

This picture is cool just because you can see the Connecticut Capitol in the background with the gold dome:

Cannon (there are two on opposite sides of the statue):

My favorite tree on campus, in the middle of the quad:

Back on Lower Long Walk facing south (with your back to the chapel) you can see Trinity's library:

If you were to continue straight toward it and go down the stairs, you would get to the courtyard in front of the library:

There's a fountain down there that I, unfortunately, did not get a picture of but the water comes out of a lion's mouth and is really cool.

This is one way to get to Trinity's quadrangle (the smaller quad on the opposite side of the main building at Trinity -- the part that faces the chapel). The other way would be to walk through one of the two arches in that building.

From the library courtyard one night, I took this picture looking across the quadrangle:

Brent took these three looking in the opposite direction toward the chapel (with the chemistry building on the left):

This picture was taken from the other side of the quadrangle, looking at the library (right) and the chemistry building (straight ahead) with the dining hall on the left:

There are lots of pretty flowers in the spring here at Trinity:

Across the quadrangle toward the library:

In the front of the library is Peter B's, a coffee shop and cafe, where Brent and I often do our work when we can't handle the thought of spending the day in the actual library.

Here's a picture of the library from the back side:

The story behind the tennis courts you see there is that my Freshman year here, Andy Roddick was supposed to be doing a modeling shoot for Reebok somewhere nearby but rain had damaged the courts somehow, so he was taken to Trinity's tennis courts to do it instead!

This picture is taken from the quadrangle facing Mather which has our main dining hall, The Cave (another dining option in the basement), The Underground Coffee House (which I am terrified of), the campus bookstore, and a bunch of offices and meeting rooms:

On the quadrangle is the Austin Arts Center, which I don't particularly care for, and Gallows Hill which used to be a bookstore but is now just a "student lounge." This picture was taken of Gallows Hill in the winter:

A beautiful tree next to Gallows Hill:

Looking toward the Austin Arts Center in the fall:

South of Mather is something known as "The Concrete Jungle." It's easily the ugliest part of campus with old brick buildings from the 70s and cement covering EVERYTHING. I lived in The Concrete Jungle this year and last year and am luckily making my escape to Vernon St. for my senior year.

I did my best, however, to photograph it in its best light.

The Concrete Jungle:

Directly to the east of the concrete jungle is the Life Sciences Center (LSC) and the LSC quad. LSC is another of Trinity's architectural abominations:

The only thing I like about it is the ivy. This is a picture of the LSC quad taken from the opposite side (near The Concrete Jungle):

On the south end of the LSC quad is the MCEC building. I have no idea what MCEC stands for, but it's the science, math, engineering, etc. building and it's supposed to be shaped like a microchip (how embarrassing):

Behind MCEC is the Buildings and Grounds building which is right next to this lovely junkyard:

You won't see this if you go on one of Trinity's "official" tours; nor will you see The Concrete Jungle or the nearby crack houses.

At least Buildings and Grounds (not worth photographing) had some pretty flowers outside (Brent's picture):

And a weed that I liked and took a picture of:

While behind MCEC, I took a picture of the back of our giant microchip:

Also back there are the Summit dorms. Summit is another excellent dorm to live in because it's new, has enormous four person rooms and singles, and every common room has a grand piano! The only problem is the location, which is awful. It's as far away from the fun side of campus as possible, and if you're anything like me, you don't like doing your hair and makeup, picking out the perfect outfit, and walking ALL THE WAY ACROSS CAMPUS to the frats in freezing rain at midnight in high heels. That's why I chose to live on Vernon St.

Summit:

I would have taken better pictures but some girl decided to sunbathe on the Summit mini-quad topless and I felt awkward with my camera out, so I snapped this quick shot and left.

I guess that's it! There are definitely a lot more dorms, academic buildings, frats, the gym, etc. that I could have included, but didn't because there's too much on this entry as it is. I hope this gives you all an idea of the atmosphere here at Trinity which is, for the most part, a beautiful college.

Thanks again to my readers for suggesting this entry! Visit Trinity's website for more information.

Posted by lauren at May 12, 2007 12:11 PM

Comments

Posted by: Lauren at May 12, 2007 03:34 PM

Posted by: Cupcakes at May 12, 2007 09:06 PM

Posted by: Lauren at May 12, 2007 09:44 PM

Posted by: brent at May 12, 2007 10:24 PM

Posted by: jocelyn at May 12, 2007 11:27 PM

Posted by: Alexis at May 15, 2007 02:58 AM

Posted by: G at May 16, 2007 08:34 PM

Posted by: 'Tree' at May 16, 2007 09:33 PM

Posted by: Lauren at May 17, 2007 12:33 AM