St Ives is a wonderful little town, worth visiting any day, but today was special. The Civic Society of St Ives had buildings open that are normally closed for the public.

First, we went to the Faizane E Madina Jamia Masjid Mosque. From the outside, it is just a normal house on a normal street, but it’s really like the TARDIS: bigger on the inside. Actually, huge. The building can accommodate hundreds of people.

We took our shoes off, but we were not expected to cover our hair. We didn’t have to wash our face, hands and feet to ensure spiritual and physical purity, but we also weren’t allowed to touch the beautiful Qur’an in Muhammad’s ancient Arabic. I learned that people are allowed to wash themselves at home before coming to the mosque to pray, so there is no crowd in the washroom.

The two prayer rooms, one directly above the other, are really long, rectangular places with the mihrab at one end, facing Mecca, and an extra soft carpet covering the whole floor with a pattern of praying carpets indicating the places for the people.

Women either pray at home, or in a separate room with no mihrab or imam.

The women’s praying room opens to another washroom where they also wash the dead before burying them in a separate part of the local cemetery.

They have two hours daily teaching, one for boys and one for girls between the age of 6 and 16.

The man who gave us the tour around the mosque, was enthusiastic and knowledgeable, willing and able to answer any questions we had.

In the Free Church on Market Hill, was a lovely exhibition of Bible stories with knitted and crocheted figures. I was amazed and took a photo of each and every scene for future educational use. They should make a book of these scenes and stories.

I’ve never known that there was a Masonic Hall just by the Great Ouse where the river boat tours start from. The building has stood there since 1861, and it has been used by the St Ivo Lodge since 1897.

Downstairs there is a dining room and a small kitchen. Upstairs there is the Masonic Temple itself with three special seats. The main one is for the Master who only holds his position for one year, then he gives it to the person who was sitting on the second most important seat, who in turn will give it to the person who was sitting in the third one.

I’ve learnt that women have their separate order and I can join them if a, I believe in the Supreme Being – it doesn’t matter which religion I belong to; b, I am over 21 years of age; and c, I am ‘of good character’. (Am I?)

We visited the beautiful chapel, consecrated in 1426, on the bridge that arches above the Great Ouse. The lady there told us that there are only four bridges with a chapel on them in England. (I distinctly remember that the guide last year told us that they were only two.)

This chapel has been a prior’s home, a prison, a doctor’s surgery and a pub called Little Hell. These days, All Saints Church has a service there once a week.

This time we didn’t see the lovely Norris Museum, the river bank – home of a million different birds, the peaceful cemetery of the All Saints or the wild Holt Island Nature Reserve, but I would certainly recommend any and all of those to visit.