Bath Visit

I'm going to be out of town for Valentine's Day, so I decided to surprise my Valentine by taking her (and the family) to Bath the weekend before. You may ask yourself, "Bath?" It happens to be the one time home of Jane Austen, of whom Shirleen is a big fan. We have the books and the movies.
We stayed at a beautiful hotel out in the country. (it's the first picture) There is a web site here that hotels use for last minute bookings. They rent the rooms at a discounted rate, but it helps them to fill their rooms. So I got the "suite" which would sleep five. Of course when one thinks 'suite' one has visions of grandeur ... nope, you'd be wrong. It was a large room with one double bed and three singles, so we all slept in the same room. But it was great, nice and cozy. It got a little noisy at night with two snorers, one teeth grinder and one who tossed and turned (none of whom was me - I would be the third snorer) but, we loved it. The place was beautiful, affordable, and the restaurant was excellent, except for the fact that it nearly killed Shirleen. But that's a story for another time.
Bath was built up beside the site of some Roman Baths, built over hot springs almost 2,000 years ago. So naming the town was no problem. The city was actually in existence at least 1500 years ago and has a long history as a resort town.
One of the interesting ways the local leaders collected property taxes at one time was by windows. The more windows you had, the more tax you paid. So to beat that, some of the home owners painted windows on their houses rather than installing the real thing and having to pay taxes. In the second picture, if you look closely you see two windows near the corner of the building. The one on the front of the house is taller and has a railing at the base. The one on the right is actually painted on. Look carefully and you can see that not only did they paint the window, but the painting actually depicts a man standing and reading a book at the window.
As I said, the city is very old and when many of the buildings were first built, they did not have indoor plumbing. As bathrooms became affordable, and winter arrived, families decided going outside to the tree was no longer the solution so what some did was to add a bathroom onto the back of the house. Even if the house was on the second floor! If you look carefully at the third picture, right in the center of the picture you can see a black box hanging off the back of a building. That is a bathroom!
Another interesting thing was the use of fireplaces, oil lamps and early vehicles turned the faces of the buildings black over the years. A few years ago the city decided to clean the houses. They charged each house over $20,000 to do it. This home owner elected not to participate. Notice how clean the building next door looks.
The last picture is a very unique bridge, one of only two like this in the world. It is a road to cross the river, but on one side of the road is a row of little shops, only about 10 feet deep. The only other one like it is the famous Bridge of Sighs in Venice. Look at how beautiful the river is. This is in the heart of Bath.