Bath: Journey to Bath, and More Sightseeing

view from the famous pier in Brighton

We left for Bath on Friday morning (Nov 4th), first going to nearby Brighton, where some people from our group had a morning field study. After walking around Brighton for a while to kill some time, we finally boarded our train to Bath.

That train actually only went to London Victoria station; we then took the tube in London to get to London Paddington station, where our connecting train departed from. In total, I think it took about 4 hours to get there. We arrived and it was already dark, so we just found our hostel, went for dinner (at a great and surprisingly cheap restaurant called Westgate) and then walked around central Bath.

The next day, much of the day was spent at Bath Abbey and the Roman Baths, both of which I've already posted about. However, before those we started off the day at the Pump Room Restaurant:

Bath Abbey in the background

The Pump Room is apparently a very famous restaurant. We were there the minute they opened for breakfast, and were the first ones in! It was quite fancy inside, and there was even a quartet playing live music!

With your meal, you get to have a glass of water that comes from the hot springs, which comes out in a fountain:

that's the Roman Baths in the background, next door!

Here's my Pump Room breakfast:

fruit scones with jam, and muesli with banana and honey. So good!

We went on a free walking tour of Bath afterwards, which last for about two hours. Below are some assorted photos from around Bath:

the river Avon, which runs through Bath.
Not the same Avon River for which
Straford-Upon-Avon is named, though;
our guide told us that there are 7 rivers
named Avon in England!

famous set of buildings called the Royal Crescent

Royal Crescent

The two photos below are of the Thermae Spa, a modern spa that only opened a few years ago, but which uses the same natural hotsprings as the ancient Roman Baths. Most of our group went to this spa the night of November 5th: Guy Fawkes Day. There were fireworks to celebrate the holiday, so some of them saw the fireworks from the spa; 2 of us stood with hundreds of other people in the square between the Abbey and park to watch from there instead.

For lunch on Saturday, we went to Sally Lunn's! It's the oldest house in Bath and is famous for its "Sally Lunn Bun", a sort of sweet large bun. I got a brie and cranberry sandwich (a really popular combo here, I'm noticing) on a Sally Lunn bun and it was delicious :) There was also a Kitchen Museum in the restaurant which showcased remains of the original Sally Lunn kitchen on the site, found during archaeological excavation.