Roaming the Roman Baths

Christine and I took the train to Bath Friday morning to spend the day in the city and wait for Bill's arrival at the B&B that night.  We started with a little scone on the go before tackling the Roman Baths

I have been here before and each time I take this same shot.  It's hard not to with Bath Abbey overlooking the algae infused Roman Bath. I managed to get a shot without a lot of tourists.  There were a fair number doing the rounds with us but nothing like the high season here yet.  The day was a typical British mix of sun, clouds, rain, more sun with a spot of wind thrown in for good measure.

We then hit the Jane Austen Center.  Somehow in my past visits with Bill I have missed this tourist hot spot.  I can't imagine why Bill never wants to go....

We should have realized as soon as we were greeted by this fine gentleman that this was going to be a bit cheesy.  The tour starts every 20 minutes so they sit you in a room of chairs facing a video playing footage from the Jane Austen festival.  As you can see the festival in 2009 was a world record for the largest gathering of people dressed in Regency costumes.  Based on the video I would have to say that it was 400 woman and 9 (gay?  coerced?) men.  Oh how the ladies loved pretending they were at the Netherfield Ball!!  Christine and I started laughing and then realized that none of the others in the room thought it was quite as funny as we did.

The comedy continued after the lecture when they lead us down stairs.  It was like going into some fanatic's basement who has dressed up a bunch of mannequins in bonnets and muslin.    My real beef with it was not so much that the displays were a bit tired but that a lot of the information they were providing about the Regency era was not then linked back to Jane's books.  Would Jane approve?  I think not.

Next stop - cheese!

Next stop after that - tea!  We found a vintage tea shop with 1940's decor.  It was the perfect little pit stop for tea and a couple of toasties.  It had lots of WWII references  Christine pulled a Bath During the Blitz book off the shelf to which I loudly announced "I love the Blitz!"  That seems like announcing that you love Auschwitz - it just doesn't sound good....

Our walk to the B&B.

We have a self catering cottage behind the B&B house.  It's perfect for 3 people with a little kitchen and a sitting area overlooking Christine's bed.  We are on our way out for the night - down the local pub which will have to be it's own post....