London: Daytrip to Bath

We hopped back on our bus and left
Stonehenge behind as we drove to our three-hour lunch stop in Bath.

Tour guide Sinead told us the area of Salisbury Plains is 95% owned by the military of defense. If we hear military-type sounds don't worry, World War III has not started, they are just doing military exercises. A comment that felt more necessary at our President was threatening to take Greenland by force and the United Kingdom and the rest of NATO was saying they would stand behind Greenland. Fortunately, we did not hear those types of sounds or see any activity.

The area between Salisbury Plains and Bath is called the Cotswold, which translates to "coats of wool," referring to their large sheep population. The Cotswold is home  to some cozy mystery series including M.C. Beaton's Agatha Raisin series. Driving through these tiny villages often with only one policeman, one church, and typically very little crime brought the pages to life for me.

Bath, explained Sinead, dates back to the Celts, who named the place after the gods of sun and water (Aquae Sulis). The Romans then took it over in AD 43 for about 400 years. They established London as the administrative head of the government, and Bath, with its natural hot springs, as a place of relaxation and restoration.

Later the Saxons and Normans took over. They widened the castle where King Edgar was crowned in 973 AD by dropping hot oil on his forehead, a tradition that is still carried out today. 

In 1499 the area was rebuilt after Bishop Oliver King said he received word from Jesus himself to rebuild the abbey. He wanted to add a ladder with angels ascending to heaven and demonic symbols, but was overruled. He did include a olive tree with a bishop's hat as a nod to himself. Today it is a Protestant church.

The Georgians came to power in the 1700s with their excessive lifestyles. Think King George I, King George II, and King George III who was ruling when the American Revolution took place. King George IV was more interested in Brighton, which has a similar Regency-style architecture. 

In 1702, Queen Anne of Denmark came to Bath to be healed by the hot springs. This started the medical tourism of the royalty and extremely wealthy people. John Wood the Elder became the senior architect of Bath, designing the city much as it still looks today with uniform looking townhouses.

Bath is the backdrop for some Bridgerton scenes.
We passed a café where scenes of the girls being fitted for ballgowns by the Modista take place. We stopped in at the end of our day and, unlike Ted Lasso's pub, I did not recognize the place. Jane Austen and Mary Shelley used to live here. We passed their museums. Over the centuries it has been the home for many famous people, including John Cleese, Jayne Seymour, and Peter Gabriel. 

We were encouraged to get lost in the town. The bus would be waiting for us at 2:45 a two minute walk from the abbey, which is visible from most of Bath. Sinead gave us a getting acquainted with Bath walking tour. Part of me wanted to skip it as it took 30 minutes away from our three hours in the city. 

Don and I walked up the hill to see the famous "circus" -- the Georgian homes built in a circle. Again, this is something we should have skipped as seeing it in person did not add anything for me versus seeing it in a picture. It just wasn't a good use of our limited time. I even toyed with skipping the tour bus and taking a train or bus back to London, but I realized I only wanted to stay an extra hour and that would have been an added expense. If you are reading this and looking for advice -- take the train from London and skip the tour. You'll have more flexibility and it is just as easy. Stonehenge, on the other hand, does not have direct mass transit,  and we were not up for renting a car. 

As we walked back down the hill I poked my head into the Jane Austen Centre. As promised there were women dressed in Regency style gowns working the gift shop. Next year is her 250th anniversary. Funny when I learned about her in school my teacher did not tie her life into the same time period as the American Revolution.

We were getting peckish at this point, but did not have time to sit at a café and linger. We opted for Cornish pastries and pressed on to the Roman Baths, our second UNESCO site of the day. They were not nearly filling enough, but better than nothing.

When I told Don I wanted to tour the Roman Baths he said he didn't want a spa day. Fair enough, Bath does still have spas, but they are not offered at this historic site. Though built by the Romans nearly 2,000 years ago, the Baths were discovered in 1871. They were rebuilt in the style Victorians thought they would have looked. Frankly, this was the thing that made the most sense on our walking tour. Our time was limited. The front desk suggests allowing an hour to visit the Roman Baths, we had about an hour if we wanted to catch our bus back to London. I did have the number of our guide, and could have found our way back. Though we did have an audio guide, I did not pause to take notes. A week later as I write this, I'm using pictures to jog my memory.

This is also the end of the notes I made about the trip.

Text in British Celtic. The only British Celtic words
known to have survived anywhere.

At one point the water line went up to the top
of the dark brown line

What a find!

I ran around Bath taking some more pictures and looking for something else to eat. I settled on a "snag," which reminded me of being back in Australia. At least my Cornish turnover was vegetarian (spinach and ricotta). Not the heathiest meals of the trip.

Modeled after Florence's Ponte Vecchio 

From here we had a relaxing three hour trip back to London. As our bus did not have a bathroom on it (is it still a loo on a bus?) we did have a brief stop on the way back. Don and I both caught some much needed shut eye and mapped out our evening plans. We tried to find a show to see, but we have either seen the show on Broadway, did not want to see it on Broadway, it was sold out, it was about to open, or tickets were more than we wanted to spend, so we decided to look at street art instead.