"...nearly killed Shirleen."

Okay, back to that story. I'm exaggerating.
We were eating dinner at this beautiful inn when Shirleen got something stuck in her throat. It did not impair her ability to breath, but it did impair her ability to swallow. It felt like it would just go down at any time, but it didn't. For several hours she tried to wash it down with liquids, push it down with food, or push it out (if you know what I'm saying) and finally it cleared. It was awful for her. The next day she could still feel where it had stuck. The only blemish on an otherwise great weekend.

Bath Visit - Continued - Fashion Museum

A museum on the history of fashion .... zzzzzzz (they got to try on corsets and hoop skirts - John and I passed on that one) The corsets were laced in the back, like in olden times, but had plastic snap buckles on the front. Amanda had fun getting the corset really tight and then taking a big breath and busting open the buckles.

Bath Visit - Continued - Architecture

Bath had some amazing buildings. A block apart are two incredible streets, one a half circle called 'The Royal Crescent' and the other a full circle called 'The Circus.' Both were the elite places to live in their 200 years ago, and still are today.
In the top right picture you can see the Royal Crescent from the air , and behind it in the distance you can see part of The Circus. The faces of the buildings are almost identical, but they vary in size in the back in order to form the circular structure. As with most of us, the rear view is not much to look at.
The American actor, Nicolas Cage, purchased a home (#8) on The Circus last year. In order to remain anonymous, he took the house number off of his door. It is in the fourth picture, the home on the right with the windows covered and no number on the door. As the tour guide explained, "it didn't take too long before the locals figured out that the house between #7 and #9 was #8."
The first picture is the Abbey on the town square.

Bath Visit Continued - Jane Austen

Jane Austen is considered Bath's most famous former resident. But the actuality is that she only lived there five years, and they were not particularly productive years. However, Bath played a part in all of her novels. It was the setting of her first two novels, and was at least mentioned in the rest.
The Jane Austen Centre was a bit of history about Jane, and a look at the times she lived in.

Bath Visit - Continued - Roman Baths

About 2,000 years ago a troop of Romans was walking along and spotted this Celtic temple beside some hot springs. They felt it was a gift from the gods. They decided to build a temple there to Minerva, who the Celtics had named Sulis so they kept the name. The Roman engineers drove massive oak pilings into the the mud and surrounded the springs with a lead lining to capture the water. Over the course of many years they built a massive religious complex surrounding the baths. When fully operational, the place was incredible. Bathing there was worship to them.
In more modern times, they decided the waters were curative. Kings, Queens and everyone else with money came to soak in the supposedly miraculous waters. It was supposed to cure everything from yellow fever to baldness. (BTW - I drank a glass, it tasted like swimming pool water - I am still bald - and thirsty)
Some of the rooms had heated floors, they had raised the floors up on rocks and channeled the warm air under the floors. The springs still flow today, over 1 million litres of water per day, which converted to gallons is somewhere in the neighborhood of three. (Okay, I don't know but I looked it up - about 257,000 gallons a day)
It is the best preserved example of Roman baths in existence today and makes you realize what amazing engineers the Romans were.
The pictures are:
1 - The exterior entrance
2, 3, 5 - The baths themselves - no longer open to the public
4 - One of the ornamental stones from the building
6 - Interior entrance, very modern and beautiful
7 - A model of what it looked like a thousand years ago

My New Personal Motto

Sign observed beside a very old, dying tree at the Lacock Abbey.

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.