Bath - The clean story!

This is going to be written in two parts, first my part, Ben.

Bath is an olden town where you go to look at old buildings and stuff. That's what we did in a nutshell. I am not a huge history buff but we did learn some very interesting, if completely useless facts. All facts came from the very reliable mayors guide Terry. If you would like to argue about the facts, Terry runs a free guided walking tour of the city, in Bath, near the pumphouse, go and see him as I don't think he has a blog.

1) In the olden days they used to work out the tax you paid by counting the number of windows you had in your house. More windows, more tax. To save money people would brick up their windows. This is where we get the term "Daylight Robbery".

2) People in the olden days often had small pox and other skin problems because of poor hygiene and so they wore face paint. The paint contained lead and would set completely hard - hence the term, "Dont smile or your face will crack." Even funnier, the lead would cause their eyebrows to fall out. To replace these they would skin mice and cut out eyebrow shapes. Very attractive.

3) The waters of bath are have been considered for thousands of years to have healing powers. A lot of research has currently suggested that its good for arthritis, although in the past it was considerd to fix other things (including infertility, but dont worry I didn't go anywhere near it). Aquatic refers to water. The doctors that used (aquatic)water to heal their patients were called Quacks(short for aquatic), and we still use the term today.

So there you go. That's my interesting history. Now for Rach.

Now for part two, Rachael.

Bath is wonderful! Terrific as London is, it was great to leave it behind for the weekend! We took a bus and drove through the countryside, passing fields divided by hedges and little stone cottages and taverns. It was exactly as I'd hoped England would be. This was the first stop on Rachael's self-guided literary tour of England(Ben was on the book tour too, but he didn't know that).

Bath was exactly up my alley. It is a beautiful old city, with a great deal of history. We took a walking tour with an elderly volunteer local, who knew all the stories and all his facts and figures. It was great! It was interesting to hear about the Barbarians, Romans and then the rich people who visited Bath for the 'season' in Georgian times - all very posh.

Bath is featured in all of Jane Austen's novels, with Northanger Abbey and Persuasion both being set there. Unfortunately when Jane herself lived in Bath she really didn't like it. We visited the Pump Room and Assembly Rooms which feature in Jane Austen's books and we (I) had a marvellous time exploring Bath as a Jane Austen fan. I thought of you Chris Baltaks the whole time! I had a lovely time at the Jane Austen Centre though I worried about the lives of the devoted fan club who Jane-Austenise everything in their path. Ben didn't love the museum, but coped admirably.

A quick run through of other Bath delights - tea shops, milliners, antiques, narrow cobbled streets, garden seats under crab apple trees, moss growing on slate rooves, a meandering river, wide stone paths, bakeries selling cream buns - need I go on?

Bath - if not for different reasons, we both loved it! Enjoy some of our pictures below.

Rachael


THE BATH ABBEY. MEDIEVIL CHURCH.


THE CIRCUS. 33 TERRACE HOUSES DESIGNED BY JOHN WOOD.


JANE AUSTEN MUSEUM. SHE LIVED IN BATH FOR SIX YEARS AND THIS HOUSE FOR A WHILE.


PULTNEY BRIDGE. IT HAS SHOPS ON IT.


BRIDGE FROM THE OTHER SIDE. THEY FILMED "VANITY FAIR" HERE(JUST RELEASED).


US AT THE ROMAN BATHS. 4M BELOW STREET LEVEL.


RACH WHERE THE WATER COMES FROM. THE KINGS BATH.


US AT THE EAST SIDE OF THE ABBEY.