Bath, United Kingdom

Whilst our room is very nice, a small bed and very warm temperatures made sleep a bit light and short, and added to that my hay fever/cold has got bad and I had those coughing fits when you lie down at night and a lot of upper respiratory fluid. Yuk. Fortunately I have packed Claratyne non drowsy – actually for Verns migrane – just in case – so have taken one of those hoping to get on top of the sneezing and sniffles. I would pick the ‘heat-wave’ week to feel like cotton wool in the head too! Nevermind, it takes more than sinus and hayfever to stop me and I still had my taste (often loose it when I have a head cold) and was able to enjoy the very good and varied menu that Ling offers.

I had poached Scottish Kippers with butter and a poached egg and Vern had an omelette (3 egg huge one). I treated myself to a piece of toast with spread and there were two I hadnt tried before – a ‘biscuit flavour’ which is exactly like specula biscuits (dutch spice cookies) and a salted caramel. Both were nice enough, but I prefer Nutella or honey :-). Ling also did a very nice and generous fruit salad which had lovely summer fruits and berries along with organic yoghurt etc. Two good coffees later and we were ready to head out to town to join a free ‘walking tour’.

Our guide this time was a retired teacher and he did not look like a cushen of mine so that was a relief. The walk lasted 21/2 hours and it was mighty good exercise in the 30 degree heat amongst the tall stone buildings and conquering the reasonable hill Bath is on. We had hats, good shoes, and water but by the time we had finished we were seeking a bit of shade and a lot more liquid. The walk was good and informative but not as good or interesting as York which has a lot richer historical past – depending on how you view it of course as the Romans and the Roman Bath part of history is interesting I am sure and we will do an in depth of that tomorrow.

Jane Austin’s parents retired here and she visited the town several times and it is mentioned in some of her books – we were shown key parts of that including the road she walked on where she met the man she fell in love with – and consequently used this scene in one of her books.

The tour covered a lot about the architecture and the main architect of the town. Of note is ‘The Circus’ (meaning circle not other circus) where a naked roof top sunbather distracted the talk – is a circular housing complex built like the Coliseum turned inside out. It has Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian capital decorations and a frieze above the first row of columns has hundreds of different panels representing the arts, sciences, and crafts. There are also 86 acorns on top which there are various stories as to the meaning some say it has to do with pigs, some Masonic, others druid’s… John Wood who designed it was a Masonic and there are other interesting symbolism woven into the design as well as influences from his fascination with Stone Henge.

After the tour we had a cuppa and a couple of cakes at a patisserie chain shop before popping into the Victoria Art Gallery which is free to view the ‘1st floor’. There was some lovely art there and I have loaded my favourites. The one of ‘Anna Bilinska’ has such a tragic sad story to it which you can totally see and feel from viewing it, and was my favourite even before I read the sad tale. Summary is she was an artist in mourning for her fiancee and fathers death and another female artist, Emmeline befriended her and did the portrait. Their lives were not easy as it was not really acceptable for women to ‘learn’ art in those days, and eventually Anna found love again, started a school for disadvantaged and or female artists in her homeland of Poland and then died young. Sniff.

Following our dose of culture where Mr. Chatty talked to the old lady volunteer (Mrs Divine) for a while we headed back over the Pulteney Bridge home to rest and hopefully blog before dinner. I love the bridge as it reminds me of an old Italian style one in Venice, where they built shops off the edge. There were some lovely little boutique eateries and shops there including an antique with sinful bling totally out of my budget for souveniers – darn – a 3 carat rock in particular (only £7,000). Whilst we had our feet up Ling knocked on the door and brought us two tall glasses with icy home made lemonade with mint and lime, which was such a lovely thought.

After a little rest of an hour we headed out for dinner and the vegetarian called Acorn was booked out again, clearly it must be very good so we booked a table for tomorrow and walked up the hill to the top of town to a sushi train which was very good. We were just about full and it only cost £20, and for dessert we went to a ‘Cafe Rouge’ (apparently they are a chain too, like the one we liked in York) and had a cheeseboard to complete our meal. The cheese was not as large a portion or quite as tasty varieties as we had in York, but still very nice and great value to share. We picked up a cider on the way home and washed down the last remnants of cheese flavour with that before retiring. It may seem tight not to buy some wine with our meal but it is very expensive here and I can’t bring myself to pay minimum £4.50 for a SMALL glass of house quality wine ($10 NZD) when I can get a 500ml bottle (2 full cups) of quality cider for £1.50-2.50 at the supermarket.

It was a tiring long hot day today- worked out we were on our feet from 9:30am till 5:00pm, with the exception of 30 minutes at lunch time. I am still trying to get some ‘down’ time but not really succeeding. My sniffles improved during the day but got worse again at home, so I am wondering if there is a plant or something at or near the B&B that does not agree with me?