A little more about Bath

Yesterday I went on a wonderful walking tour of the city of Bath. It was led by one of the 80 volunteer guides and runs under the auspices of the Mayors office.  We covered quite a bit of ground and got a good idea of the history of Bath, but this, and the concert later in the day, meant that I ran out of time to see the two famous sites of Bath - the Abbey, and the Roman Baths.  Thus this morning I spent a few hours wandering about both sites.  I know there are a number of people expecting me to make some comments on the Roman baths and show a few pictures, hence this post.  I must also point out that there are many other things to see in Bath - the Jane Austen museum and a fashion museum to name a couple.

It seems incredible that the baths, huge and sprawling under the streets of Bath for many hundreds of metres, are really the only thing left of the Roman times in the region, and even then they were changed quite a bit by the Georgians when the baths became popular as a healing, restorative, and social venue.  Things such as balconies were added so that the public could view the baths and statues were carved to decorate the site, though the Romans too did their fair share of changing the baths in the 400 years or so that they were there.  They raised and lowered floors, opened new pools, built new rooms and closed others, and so the place has always been, to  some degree, a place of change.

 The colour of the water is a pearly green and this main pool would have been a meeting place.

 The ancient Roman baths are overlooked by the very old, but young by comparison, Abbey.

 The holy spring, the source of the hot water, was deepened in in Georgian times (the reddish line part way up the wall), but lowered in the 70's to the level it was in Roman times.  The spring bubbles up at 1,170,000 litres per day and the temperature is 46°.

The opposite side looking through a " window"

 The overflow from the spring flows into a drain, which in turn flows into the river.

This drain takes the overflow from the baths to the river.

 Inside the Abbey the lines are simple and elegant.

 I mentioned previously about the famous people who have association with Bath.  Here, in the Abbey, is an Australian connection, a memorial plaque for Admiral (we've demoted him to captain!) Arthur Phillip, the first Governor of NSW.

A couple of different views of the Abbey in the morning sunshine.

.......... and New Year in Bath.

It is New Years Day, and currently raining, but it doesn't matter because today has been a rest day, and tomorrow the forecast is for fine weather again.  I have had an extraordinary week of good weather - if you can call minus 3 or 4 good!

After Christma, parts of the UK had quite heavy falls of snow, in fact most of the places where I have been walking, yet where I was I just had frost - HEAVY frost!  One day, setting off it did indeed look as if the place was blanketed in snow.  Everything was white and remained so for most of the day, but walking meant that I stayed cosily warm.  With the frosty days the sun came, weak, but sun nonetheless.

This has been a week where I have crossed the Cotswolds, or skirted across them I should say.  Like Shropshire, the Cotswolds are lovely, primarily rolling hills (or that's the part I have seen at least) and because I had been warned about the hills I avoided them on my first day out of Gloucester, choosing to follow the Gloucester Sharpness canal instead.  The hills though were nowhere near as bad as I thought, and once on the tops I was treated to lovely views falling away.

St James church at Quedgeley.  I went in here and had a sing, a lovely thing to do on such a gorgeous day.

The Gloucester and Sharpness canal is very wide.  It was once the widest and deepest in the world.

The threatening weather eventually meant that I had to don my rain coat and put up with a shower for about 10 minutes.

After leaving the canal I headed towards the hills of the Cotswolds, stopping at a village called Cam (I had stayed in the village of Cambridge the night before).  I went to church here, and afterwards I was taken to Marilyn and Roy's home for coffee and lunch, a lovely treat.  Roy has walked the Camino and so we exchanged Camino experiences.  After lunch he kindly escorted me, along with Bertie the dog, up the hill to the path.  Once on the top it was a different world, bright sunshine and people everywhere enjoying the experience.  The frost was forming near their home, and by the time I got to my destination it was well and truly forming along the top.  I chose a lane where trees overhung the asphalt to descend to the village of Wotton Under Edge, as the Old London Road that I was on had already got dangerously slippery from ice and the sun was just setting.

Bertie escorted me to the top of the hill, along with his owner, Roy.

At the top I walked through the golf course, along with all the dog walkers,

and heading towards Wotton Under Edge I had some colourful views of the hillsides.

Leaving Wotton Under Edge thick frost covered cars and the ground.......

.......freezing puddles and the mud, .......

 ......... and making us all "breathe smoke".

At three o'clock it still lay thick in the shadows.

Although I had walked a little on the Cotswold Way, I tended to follow the lanes near it as I was sick of slipping and sliding in mud, but heading into Bath I followed it most of the time.  There were a couple of slippery places, but mostly I could scoot along pretty quickly on the frozen mud.  

Following the Cotswold Way,

 ........ and the views.

 This stretch began as frozen mud, but then got "slippy".  I was several inches taller by the top,........

.......... but I could still smile!

 I finds it quite amazing that paths just go straight across paddocks like here!

 Several of the churches I passed had what looked like " battlements".

There were a few hilla to climb on the last day, but the views were worth it.

Bath has been lovely.  It is not at all as I expected.  I had been told by numerous people about the Roman heritage, yet, apart from the Roman Baths it is really a Georgian town.  The Georgians demolished the mediaeval and Roman buildings to make way for their classic designs.  Much of it was destroyed during the war through bombing raids, and a lot has been rebuilt or restored. It is a town with a lot of history, and because of its importance socially in the 18th and 19th centuries many famous people are associated with it.

 Pulteney bridge, spanning the River Avon.  From here it looks like a bridge, but crossing it it looks like a street, with shops on both sides of it.

 Parade Gardens, Bath, in the frost.

 These collonades were built so that the "hoy polloy", taking the waters in Bath, could stay dry walking from one spa to the other.

 Jane Austen lived in one of these buildings, after her father died, but they are not sure which one.

 The little slate grey box hanging on the side of the building in the centre is an example of a "hanging toilet".  This was quite an advance to have an "inside" toilet.  Because everything in Bath is heritage listed the owners of this building have to maintain the box - probably now used as something like a broom cupboard or similar! 

 As mentioned previously, many of the rich and famous have lived in Bath.  The Royal Crescent, above, had people like Pittman (Pittman's shorthand) and the (Grand old) Duke of York living here.....

.....while in these house on The Circus such people as Doctor Livingstone (I presume), Thomas Gainsborough and Clive (of India) lived here.

The Abbey and the Roman Baths are right in the centre of Bath, with tourists teaming around them most of the day, even wet cold ones like this.  Having said that, today has been quite mild with the temperature reaching double figures, but set to plummet tomorrow!

The Abbey.  This was where the first coronation was held, and over a thousand years later, the same format is still used for coronations - though it must be said it is over 60 years since the last coronation!

 As mentioned earlier, the facades to almost everything are Geoargian in style - even the surrounding wall around the Baths, and the entrance to them (below)

As usual I spent a quiet New Years Eve.  I saw some of the fireworks from my bedroom window, and I certainly heard them!  I have had a treat today attending a New Years Day concert with Laura, an Australian friend now living in England with her young family.  She is a musician and so we were able to chuckle together over the energetic style of the conductor.  We both enjoyed hearing and seeing some good music being performed - a good way to start 2015!  I wonder what else it will bring.

Happy New Year to you all.

Christmas in Gloucester ............

Well Christmas has come and gone, and though my food intake on the day was a bit different and somewhat scanty, I had a feast of music while in Gloucester.

Last year on my winter Camino in Spain my Christmas dinner consisted of bread and cheese, and tea was an omelette sandwich.  This year I continued on the bread and cheese theme with added meat, having just the one meal late in the afternoon.  I mentioned to the hotel that I was going to help myself to a bread roll to have for lunch, but they offered to do some cold meat and cheese for me.  I got a very pleasant surprise when I removed the foil, discovering a huge serve of cold ham, turkey, and cheeses, complete with cranberry sauce and mustard.  Very tasty, and I certainly didn't starve!

How did I spend Christmas?  I went to Church three times, hearing some wonderful music and one especially good Christmas morning sermon given by the Bishop of Tewkesbury.  I even had a chat to him after the service and it was only after someone addressed him as "your grace" that I realised maybe I should have been bowing and scaping, instead of treating him like the bloke next door!.  Oh well, you can't take these uncouth Australians anywhere!

Last year I went to midnight mass (Catholic) in a little chapel in the hotel, where I listened to a wheezy (harmonium) organ playing occasionally, and a nun coughing continually in between the sung responses.  This year at midnight mass (Anglican) the organ thundered, so loud I could feel it at times.  That service had the girls choir, whereas the earlier carol service, and the Christmas day service, had the treble choir.  The carol service was "sardine packed", and even though I got there nearly an hour early the only seat I could find was on a stone bench against the wall.  The music at all these services was splendid, and I especially enjoyed Rutter's Shepherds Pipe Carol, though I didn't appreciate quite so much the Messiaen organ work.

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The tomb of King Edward II is in Gloucester Cathedral which was to become a pilgrimage site.    

Gloucester Cathedral basking in the Christmas Day sunshine.

 On Christmas Day the sun shone so brightly through the stained glass windows it threw jewel like light on all it touched, the people, the floor, and the magnificent Norman pillars.

Christmas day was crisp, cold and sunny.  I spent several hours wandering around the docks, stopping at the little Mariner's Church on the way.  This church was open and empty, as was the little upright piano, and so I spent a lovely half hour playing through the hymn book - the only music there.

Not many people were around, and the only accents I heard were Eastern European.  Boxing day though was different, people out for the sales, but also families out testing their presents - children on roller skates, skate boards, and cycles.

The little Mariners Church, Gloucester Dock's.

Gloucester has wonderful docks.  Most of the warehouses flanking the docks were once used by grain merchants.  After the repeal of the corn laws in the mid 1800,s these docks were a hive of activity, with sailors from many countries arriving on the vessels used for transporting the grain.

The wharehouse buildings at the docks have numerous small windows.  Originally they would have been open spaces, allowing for plenty of ventilation.  This whole area was once a hive of activity, and has undergone a transformation as a residential area and part of it as an outlet shopping precinct.

This gives a good idea of how close the docks are to the city centre.  The cathedral, in the distance, is about a 10 minute walk away.

An ornate half timbered building, now a bar and restaurant.

There are a number of old churches in the centre of Gloucester, this being one of them.

This tower marks "the cross", the centre of Gloucester.

The streets of Gloucester had festive decorations strung across them.

I stayed here while in Gloucester.  The New Inn (above & below) is a grade 1 heritage listed building and is the best preserved mediaeval courtyard Inn in Britain.  It was from the balcony of this Inn, in 1553, that Lady Jane Grey was declared Queen after the death of Edward VI.

I'm so glad that I made it to Gloucester for Christmas.  It is an easy city to get around, with so much history.  The biggest treat of all was to hear such wonderful music in the magnificent Cathedral.