Yes, the fun puns are endless when there is a town named Bath, with Roman baths in it. I could pretend that I took a bath in a bath in Bath, but I just visited the town. I went to the Roman baths, yes, but they don’t let you take a bath there. Weird, no?
Olga and I took the 9:00 train to Bristol which stops at Bath. It took about an hour and a half, not all that bad. The train was smooth, easy, and expensive. Which is why, in two weekends, when I go to Glastonbury via Bristol, I am going to take a bus. It cost £10 round-trip for the bus. I think the train was something like £30. But anyway, you will be happy to know that I didn’t miss the train like I missed my bus last weekend. So I got there all safe and sound.
Bath is really quite small. We started off just walking along. It was a lovely day, though rather chilly. We went by a pretty Roman Catholic church with some hills behind it. Very picturesque. Our first stop was the Roman Baths, which are right by the Abbey. We didn’t go in the abbey, but we looked at it from outside.
The Roman Baths are really impressive. They have it set up very well, so that you get a really good sense of what the bath complex was like and what various rooms were used for. There were also different viewing areas for the same place, so you could get a really good look at, say, the spring. I thought that was great–usually you only get one little view of things, and it isn’t always a good one. The baths themselves were lovely and a little eerie. There was mist coming off of them because it was cool. The hot water is natural and turned greenish when exposed to the air because algae grew in it, but it would have been clean and clear in Roman tiems with a roof over it.
Our next stop was the Fashion Museum, which was really cool! I’m a sucker for old-timey costume, and this was a fun exhibit. They had showcases which showed clothing of a certian type (evening wear, underwear, etc) through the ages. And I really liked the interactive spots they had; I put on a corset and tried a crinoline but it didn’t really work very well. There were hats, too, to try on.
Not too far from there is the Jane Austen Center. Now, I admit to not being a wild fan of Jane Austen, but it was fun to go in and learn about her and see their little exhibition. She led a rather sad life. I think the Brontes had a harder life, but Jane Austen’s was no picnic. And Becoming Jane has quite a bit of fiction in it from what I gathered during my visit. Oh, and tomorrow, Keira Knightly is filming The Duchess there. Pretty cool, eh?
Our last semi-official stop was a museum at the edge of town. On the way, we crossed a bridge with shops on it and had chocolate at a chocolate bar (I had an orange chocolate brownie, yum!!!). At the museum, there were a few paintings I recognized, and I was kind of interested by the silver dinner services because I kind of wanted to know what each object was used for. It was pretty small, so we didn’t stay for too long.
After that, we walked around the outskirts of town as it got dark. It was a pretty evening, really. We wandered for a little while, looking in the cute shops and enjoying the comfy air of Bath. We were both pretty hungry, so we found a good pub to get dinner. We stayed there for a while because our train didn’t leave until 7:45 and we got to the pub at 5:30. Then we wandered over to the train station and just waited there until the train came. Then it was back to London. There were fireworks all over the place for the end of Diwali.
But I did do other stuff throughout the week. On Sunday I went on the “Gunpowder, Treason, and Plot” walk around Westminster. It was pretty interesting, and I learned a bit about the Gunpowder Plot. I also learned about the State Opening of Parliament on Tuesday. I was definitely psyched. The Queen opens Parliament every year (oddly, the day after Guy Fawke’s night . . . ) and our guide told us she’d be coming from Buckingham Palace and showed us where she’d be entering. So I left at 9:15 on Tuesday morning and found myself a great place and waited until 11:15. There was lots of entertaining stuff going on: horses and cars and all kinds of stuff, so the time went by really quickly. And then the Queen rolled by in her carriage! I got a video of it, realizing that I probably wouldn’t be able to get a very good picture.
So all in all, it’s been a pretty good week!
P.S. I have rescheduled my trip to Glastonbury; I’m going with Sara. Yey!
