Bath In A Nutshell

In an effort to catch up on my blog articles, I’m condensing the remaining three of our four days in Bath into one blog entry because, frankly, our time in Bath wasn’t all that interesting!  It’s a nice little town and, after our first day of crappy food, we managed to find a few decent places to eat, but two days here would have been enough, and four days was total overkill.  Bath might be a good spot to holiday if I lived nearby and needed a relaxing getaway, but as a backpacker, it’s just overpriced without much to see or do…

Part of the reason Bath is so pricey is because it’s the oldest of England’s principal tourist destinations.  Talk to any British person and you’ll find that they’ve been to Bath at least once.  Talk to any American who has been to the UK and if they were in London, it is likely they also visited Bath.  The first sign that Bath isn’t a backpackers type of vacation is the fact that every third house you see is a B&B guesthome (since there are so many tourists), but there are only four hostels.  Of these, two have terrible ratings and two have a number of bad reviews so we decided to book at a B&B and pay the premium.

Unfortunately, the B&B we booked at (Austen guesthouse) suddenly had to shut down due to severe plumbing problems, so they rearranged for us to stay at another place called The Firs.  Although our room was very comfortable and the owner was nice, the location was terrible – 2 km away from city center in a residential area with just one small supermarket and 2 restaurant options.  Since buses in Bath aren’t cheap (₤1.85 one way), we should have just paid more to stay in the center!

For our first day in Bath, Paul decided to stay in because he felt like he was getting the flu, so I made the trek to town by myself to go shopping.  Much to Paul’s dismay, I’ve decided to continue reading a set of children’s books called A Series Of Unfortunate Events (I read book one back in University while doing a children’s literature course), which only come in hardcover.  For some unknown reason, Bath has an abundance of thrift and used book stores, and I couldn’t resist when I found 4 of the A Series Of Unfortunate Events books for just ₤1 each (I paid over $10 for the first book!).  Let’s just say Paul was not amused when I returned with 4 hardcover books, but I promised I’d be the one carrying them around until we could send them home with him in 3 weeks on his scheduled flight back for business!

The next day we walked to city center together to check out the Bath Abbey, the Roman Baths, Bath Market, and a large circular space surrounded by townhouses called The Circus.  None of the sightseeing wowed me, but they all have historical significance and were quite pretty.  Because we couldn’t agree on anywhere to eat on our way home, we ended up going back to the pizza/pasta takeout place near the B&B again, but this time we ordered a pizza, which tasted ok.  I guess that’s how they stay in business!

On our last night in Bath, we did the Bizzare Bath comedy walk, which is rated the second most popular attraction in Bath on TripAdvisor.  While I found it humorous, I don’t think I’d rant and rave about it the way people on TripAdvisor do.  It was nice to do a tour that wasn’t focused on the history like most tours are, but I think a little bit of history would have been good because without it, a walking tour loses its purpose – you don’t really need to walk all over the place to see a comedian do his act!  Some of the jokes pertained to all these different places we walked to, but there were a lot of stretches where it seemed like we were walking for no reason. 
  
So there you have it, four days in Bath summed up in 2 blog articles.  Not our most thrilling stop, but Bath is a hotspot for hen and stag parties (we passed like 5 of them on our last night), and a good spot to go for a spa vacation.  Personally I doubt I’ll ever come back, but never say never!