Bath; Saturday, 07 August, 2021

An early start as I had a two part tour booked for the morning. The first part of the tour was a cruise along a small section of the River Avon, from near the start of the Kennet and Avon canal up to the Weir at Pulteney Bridge. The second part of the tour was a walking tour through the centre of Bath, taking in all of the key sights and acting as a good way to get my bearings of the city.

The tour finished a short distance from the Abbey so I wandered back there to have a bit more of a look around. I made it just in time as they were due to close the Abbey for a big wedding about 15 minutes after I arrived – but that was enough time to have a look around.

I was trying to decide what I was going to do for the afternoon – I had two plans that were interchangeable for Saturday and Sunday, but after having a quick check on a weather app it became clear that the next couple of hours were likely to be quite wet, so I opted to spent at reasonable amount of that time in the dry of a bus. I headed over to the bus station and picked up the Mendip Xplorer bus for a pleasant ride through the Somerset countryside to the city of Wells.

As if almost by planning within seconds of the bus leaving the bus station in Bath the skies opened and the entire journey was accompanied by varying levels of rain from the mild drizzle to the full on downpour.

Having arrived in Wells, with it still drizzling heavily, I headed over to the shelter of the substantial Cathedral to have a look around that, including it’s impressive Chapter House located up a very worn set of medieval steps.

By the time I’d looked round the cathedral the weather had dramatically improved so I was able to leave the cathedral into the sunshine and have a bit more of a wander around the area. First stop was the impressive medieval Vicar’s close, a small lane of cathedral owned houses, linked via a footbridge over the road to the Chapterhouse and on into the cathedral. Walking back from Vicar’s close I took in the stunning views of the cathedral from across the cathedral green.

From the Cathedral it was a short walk next door to the Bishops Palace. Built at a time where Bishops had quite a bit more power than they do today, and weren’t always the most liked of people, it is almost more castle like than a castle, with a large fortified outer gatehouse and once through that an inner wall with turrets surrounded by a moat. Today the Bishop of Bath and Wells still resides in a small part of the building, but the rest of the building and the gardens are open to the public to look around. I spent quite a bit of time looking round the gardens and ramparts of the palace before heading inside to look through the couple of rooms that are open to the public. By then it was heading towards closing time for the palace and I needed to head back to the bus station to pick up my bus back to Bath.

Arriving back in Bath I had enough time to quickly grab some dinner before my timed entry to the Roman Baths came round. The Baths are what give the city it’s name and have held it’s fortunes through the centuries from the Romans to the Georgians. The only thing that stopped Bath’s development beyond the Georgian period was the sudden boom for sea-bathing and the Prince Regent, later George IV, moving the court to Brighton.

Whilst access to the museum and the complex is via a Georgian building, once inside much of the remains are as they would have been in the days of the Romans, with the hot spring still rising and flowing into the Grand Bath – the iconic view of the city that most postcards show. In the summer months the complex is open later into the evening, with flaming torches lit around the Grand bath to give an idea of what it would have been like during the Roman era, though the pop-up bar – and it’s prices – are much more 21st century.

I’d timed my ticket to ensure I was there during sunset and it was spectacular to watch the whole light and mood of the place change as the sun went down, with the flaming torches adding to the vibe. By the time I finally left the baths it was dark, so I took a couple more pictures of the Abbey lit up at night, before heading back to my hotel and turning in for the night.