What a way to take a Bath

Saturday, September 22, 2007

We got up early on Saturday morning to head out to Bath. The fare on the train was much much cheaper if you left around 7:00am, and that way we would have a full day out also. The train left from Paddington station, so we figured out the best way to get over there that early in the morning, which involved taking a route we had never taken before. We picked up the bus very easily (although it was 12 minutes late) and took it over to Euston Station. We noticed that they didn't have the right tube line, so asked and found out that we were at the wrong station, we should have been at Euston Square Station. We started panicking at this point, worried that we would miss the train. So, we asked someone where we could grab a cab and found out that Euston Square was very close, so a quick, mad dash down the road later, we finally were on the way to Paddington. We ended up making it with 15 minutes to spare... whew, what a way to start the day.

The ride to Bath wasn't too long, just one and a half hours, and we got there before anything really opened up. We ended up starting at the Roman Baths since we expected that to fill up quickly. We still didn't beat all of the tour busses, but it wasn't too crowded. The Roman Baths were built by the Romans when they originally settled the area since they had naturally warm springs.

The Royal Bath:



We then headed up to the Jane Austen Center. This weekend they were celebrating the Jane Austen festival, so we went by the center where they gave a little talk about her life and about the time that she lived in Bath. They also had costumes from the BBC miniseries that had been done recently on one of her novels call Persuasion. We then headed back down to the main promenade where they were having a processional of people dressed in costume.

Part of the parade:



We then walked around the shops, up to the Pulteney Bridge that has tons of shops. This is only 1 of 3 actual bridges with shops on it. We made sure to go into the chocolate shop to get a few samples. We then walked up Walcot Street and over to the Fashion Museum. The Museum was a little disappointing, but it wasn't too bad. We had lunch at the Slug and Lettuce (which is much much better than it sounds). As a bonus, they serve Fruili, so Tami was happy.

The Pulteney Bridge:



We then walked over and admired the Circus, an impressive circle of houses designed by John Wood and Royal Crescent, a much larger set of houses (in a semi-cirlce) designed by his son. Then we headed back into town and hit a few more shops before going to the Bath Abbey and looking around inside. It was very nice, and as a bonus, we were allowed to take pictures of the inside.... woohoo!

Inside the Abbey:



The Abbey at night:



After the Abbey, we had tea and "Bath Buns" at The Pump Room. We also tried the water from the springs, but it was warm and smelly.... I wouldn't recommend it. Some people like it though since one group downed three glasses while we were there. After tea, we went to the Thermae Bath Spa where you can go into the warm spring water through one of the pools. The best pool was on the roof and overlooked the town... it was very impressive. We spent two hours at the pool before drying off and having supper and a pint at the Huntsman Pub. We then strolled around the town which had mostly closed down until it was time for our train to leave again around 9:00pm.