Road trip to Bath - Part 6 - Tony goes to Stonehenge

For our third day on the roadtrip, we decided to drive around the Western England countryside and take in a few of the sites not easily accessible without a car. It is stunning. I drove an hour from Bath to Stonehenge, which, though right off the road is out in the middle of nowhere.





It was a clear and beautiful day, but very, very cold and windy out there. They dogs had to wait in the car while we walked around the site. I continue to find it to be enigmatic and impressive. Even more so when I reflect that the stones were transported some 200 miles to this location.

Roadtrip to Bath - Part 5 - Sally Lunn's Buns.

One of the culinary highlights of Bath are the well renowned Sally Lunn's Buns. These should not be mistaken for the other Bath Buns, which Rick Steves calls "forgettable".

We went to Sally Lunn's Bakery, which is just around the corner from the Roman Baths, for dinner. I had a steak, which comes served on top of a Bun, and Tony ordered soup, which came with a Bun covered with a delicious Garlic Butter Spread.

The buns are light and fluffy and awesome!

On our way out of the restaurant, I saw that the British Science Fiction hero, Dr Who, was a fan of Sally Lunn's buns.

Roadtrip to Bath - Part 4 - The Roman Baths

It was raining again when we went to see the Roman baths in Bath.





As is was darkish, they'd turned on the torches which gave the baths a really neat ambiance.






The baths in Bath are the finest examples of Roman ruins in the UK, and they are well worth the visit. The facility was very large in its original incarnation, and it is impressive just how large it was in comparison to the relatively small size of the city at that time.


The original hot spring that fed the hot water to the baths is still flowing, and in a dark chamber below the Pump Room, you can see where the overflow tunnel is still flowing with the hot water. It looks much like the heart of the Roman Baths still beating out its hot life blood.

A gold head of the Roman Goddess Sulis-Minerva still sits in the baths. The name is actually a combination of Roman and Celtic names. In an amazing move of PR, the Romans merged some of the differing cultural ideals to create a hybrid society.






One interesting piece of sculpture comes from the capital that once stood over the baths. It again shows this merging of Roman and Celtic cultures and artistic styles. For this reason, it is often sighted as one of the most important pieces of art at the baths.

Unfortunately, by the time we'd finished exploring the baths, the Pump Room upstairs was closed for a private function, and we were unable to get our free glass of mineral water from the well, so I can't tell you what it tasted like.

Road Trip to Bath - Part 3 - The Mayor's Tour

There is a great tour of the town of Bath, and it is absolutely free. The tradition dates back to the early 1900s when the mayor of Bath began giving tours of his town to people. This eventually became a tradition, and now volunteers give tours every day, rain or shine, and they are still absolutely FREE.













We met up with our tour guide in front the Roman Baths, which shares the same square as the Bath Abbey church, which is stunning.








The front of the church is covered with angels climbing up and down ladders helping people to get to heaven.




The interior is surprisingly light are airy. Simply beautiful.



The tour took us all over the city. The weather started off nice, but deteriorated into a miserable rainstorm. Welcome to England. . .

We walked up and down many streets seeing some of the beautiful architectural buildings in the town and they really are beautiful.

We saw where there are bathing facilities today that one can visit to experience the local hot springs.

Roadtrip to Bath - Part 2 - Bath

Bath is a beautiful town. It owes its origins to the only natural hot springs in Great Britain. When the Romans controlled the region, they seized upon them and built an enormous bathing facility and temple over them. When they left, the facility fell into obscurity and was lost. It wasn't until the late 1600's that the area came back into prominence and was developed as a gambling/resort town for the London well to do.





At that time, it came to look much as it does today with the Limestone constructed townhouses and crescents all built in the vein of the architectural philosophies of the italian architect Andrea Palladio.



We arrived safely at The Marlborough House, a Dog Friendly B&B and checked in. It is only 2 blocks from one of the main sites, The Royal Crescent, which is a huge townhouse complex built in the 1700s and has a large public green in front of it.






The weather was cooperating, so we took the dogs up there and played on the lawn with the dogs. Daffodils were growing everywhere, and in the late afternoon light, they almost appeared to glow.






It was a wonderful way to end our the first day on our roadtrip.

Road Trip to Bath - Part 1 - Castle Combe

For Easter weekend, I rented a car for a road trip to Bath, which is about a 2.5 hour drive west from London. I had not driven yet in the UK and felt that it was about time.









I took the bus down to the Enterprise Rent A Car office by Russell Square, and picked up the car. The car was an automatic so I wouldn't have to worry about learning to shift with the opposite hand. Adapting to driving on the opposite side of the road would prove challenging enough. Of course I purchased full insurance.



There was a surreal moment when I slipped into the opposite side of the car to drive for the first time. Ultimately, it proved to be less difficult than I imagined.







In no time, we were out of London and on the M4 heading west. If not for some patches of heavy rain, and a few traffic accidents we passed (none that I was involved with) we would have made better time.


Our first stop was at a small town called Castle Combe. It is a small fairytale village which has served as the filming location for the original Dr. Doolittle movie as well as the recent charming film, Stardust. It looks like a village right out of time.

As we parked the car in the parking lot outside of the town, and walked down the tree covered road, I couldn't help but feel that we were being transported back through time to some sleepy Brigadoon style village.

There was a magnificent mansion that has been converted into a hotel called conveniently, "The Mansion House Hotel".





There is a huge front lawn with a croquet course. It even has a stream running through the idyllic property.







It would be really neat to come back here in the middle of summer for a getaway weekend..

But it was getting late, so it was time to make our way onto Bath. Tony plotted in our course using my iPhone to navigate us.

Unfortunately, sometimes it plots a very unusual course, so we ended up driving this 1 lane unfinished country road. It was a bumpy rocky ride, but untimately we made it to Bath.

COSTCO! in London!

I was so excited to hear that there was a Costco in London, however I was disappointed to find out that without a car, it would take 1.25 hours to get there. As this weekend, I had rented a car to drive to Bath, this was the perfect opportunity to go check the island of American consumerism out.




Costco is awesome. The prices (if you ignore the pounds to dollar conversion) are the same as in America, and all the portions are HUGE. It is almost disgusting how huge they are after seeing the small size portions everything is sold in, in central London. Of course, no one has the space to store this much stuff.



They sell a proper American (large) refrigerator with water and ice in the door just like our (snif) refrigerator back home. We drooled over it for 5 - 10 minutes alongside some other people who had lived in the US for a while. Sigh. . .










It is great to find some of the "hard to find" American food items that are staples of our culture.





Skippy's Super Chunk peanut butter, French's Yellow Mustard, Giradelli's Brownie Mix, Krusteaze Pancake Mix, and






They even sell some products you would never see in a Costco in the US: Haggis and and jumbo sized rolls of Black Pudding (Shriek!). When in Rome, however. . .

Of course you can also while doing your grocery shopping, pickup a pool. In England, you don't even need to fill it up. The regular rain showers will do that for you. . .








It was also nice to see that you can get a traditional Costco slice of pizza (which was actually better that the pizza served at the Costcos back home) and a Hot Dog.

Before we knew it, like any good visit to Costco, we'd bought more than we had planned to and began to wonder how we would fit it all in the car along with our luggage and the 2 dogs.

A Fantastic place for any ex-pats living in London to get that feeling that they've died and gone to America.