<p>The piano facilities at Williams were probably the best of all of the colleges I visited. There are tons of practice rooms. All of the practice grands are Steinways, and there are enough to go around that I've never not been able to practice on a Steinway grand when I wanted to. Additionally, Williams owns several great concert pianos including at least one Steinway-D, and an incredible Bosendorfer grand (it has the extra octave of keys and everything). The best thing about the concert pianos is that you can practice on them!! I practice every day on the beautiful large steinway in one of the primary recital halls (besides being a wonderful piano, it's so much fun to practice on stage!).</p>
<p>I'm not sure what the "4 other sister colleges" that you're referring to are. </p>
<p>I don't leave Williams frequently, but it's certainly possible if you're interested. The motorcoach service (a student run business) runs buses down to NYC and Boston every weekend, and the price is partially subsidized by the college. There is a regular bus(es?) that run through Williamstown. Every year there is a college-sponsored trip to Montreal which provides transportation, and 2 nights of lodging at a nice hotel in a central neighborhood for a super-cheap price. Additionally, there are 5-6 weekend trips down to NYC run by the OCC where you stay at the Williams Club and get to do all sorts of neat things with alumni in a particular field. The one I went on was three days, with transportation to and from NYC, hotel, breakfasts, one lunch, a bus tour of the city, a tour of good morning america, several really cool activities we did with big-shot alumni, and tickets to The Lion King on broadway all provided for $110.</p>
<p>Well, Janerdoo, since I've been here almost two years and have no idea who our "sister colleges" are, I'd say we don't visit them a whole lot. For most of us the only time we go to other campuses is for sports games or to visit friends. We're pretty far from most places, so it's not like you pop over for a Saturday night unless you have a reason to.</p>
<p>As far as leaving campus to go to cities, it really varies. I'm from NYC so I tend to go a little more often than most people, and I go maybe once every six weeks or so (mostly for vacations and long weekends). I'd say once a year each to Boston, NYC, and Montreal is average for the non-resident of those places, and the trips tend to be during Winter Study or when we have long weekends. </p>
<p>Freshman year my entry went to Montreal for a weekend and Boston for a day. Boston is about 3 hrs away, NYC about 3.5, Montreal maybe 4 or 4.5. So it's a bit of a trip to get to a city, but it's very doable for a weekend.</p>
<p>Haon, the motorcoach isn't every weekend, it's mostly just before and after breaks. That said, there's a Bonanza bus that runs from Williamstown twice a day and can get you to NYC for $35, so it's not hard to get out even when the school isn't running buses.</p>
<p>They started running it every weekend...at least they did during winter study. I'm not positive if it's a year-long thing or what's going on with it--the motorcoach director came to college council for funding though. I think it's about ~20$ round trip.</p>
<p>ack, first of all, sorry about my mentioning the 'four sister colleges'... you guys don't have those!!</p>
<p>it said in my letter that 25% of williams students double major... this is a pretty high rate, and i'd like to know why double majoring seems to be so easy there. I know at a few of the other schools i'm considering (yale and princeton), double majoring is discouraged because of the focus that goes into a senior thesis, course limitations, etc. </p>
<p>haon, what year are you currently in? I think i've seen several of your posts asking about the residential college systems at a few other schools (like yale), and i was pretty confused. you <em>are</em> a williams student, right?</p>