Recent holiday to the British Isles, Part 6 - A Lot of Time on Busses

On the 7th of January, Gillian and I headed out to Bath. Getting there was not much fun. Gillian looked on the internet for a National Express route from MK to Bath and found one that left at 9 in the morning and got to Bath at around 2.30pm. But when we went to the ticket office, the woman there told us that there was another bus just the same that left at 9.45. Because neither of us are morning people, we decided to get the 9.45 bus. That bus ended up being cheaper than the one Gillian had seen on the internet, but we should have realised that there was a reason it was cheaper.

The bus route Gillian had found on the internet had gone to Heathrow, changed busses, and then out to Bath, which is a logical route. But the route that the lady recommended us went all the way into Victoria Station. It takes a long time to get through the streets of London to anywhere, so that added a lot of time onto our journey. But then we had to do it again on the bus that took us back out of London. Then we found out just why our ticket had been so cheap. The bus we were on kept leaving the motorway and going to stops in the middles of various towns. Now, the woman at the ticket office had told us that both routes were essentially the same because only the MK - London bus was different, the London - Bath bus was the same. She TOLD us we would get to Bath at the same time. That woman doesn't know her arse from her elbow. It took us hours longer to get to Bath than we were expecting. That bus to Bath stopped at every single stop along the way, and it took AGES.

Also the in-bus entertainment was not so entertaining. There was an interesting episode of Top Gear shown, but after that was an episode of the Vicar of Dibley, then a few more comedies. Then the tape RAN OUT. The bus journey was so long that the National Express had not provided enough entertainment for it!

But we eventually got to Bath sometime between four and five in the evening, and set out to find our B&B. Now, Gillian had a map of Bath she had printed off the internet with our B&B labelled, but the map was about 4x4 cm, and so the bus and train stations were not labelled. Roads were labelled, but that did not help out because the streets themselves did not have signs. In Bath, it seems, only tourist attractions are labelled. The Circus and the Royal Crescent will naturally have signs, but other streets? Only if someone gets around to it.

I said "I think it's that way," pointing towards the hills because the B&B owner had told Gillian on the phone that the B&B was on a hill. But Gillian charged off in the other direction saying she needed to find a street name first (which led to our discovery that there are no road signs in Bath). We found numerous signs pointing to 'Roman Baths' and 'Bath Abbey' and all sorts, but not a single street name. So we ended up walking in a big circle and arriving back at the bus terminal (but we found food on our circuit, so it was not a complete waste of time). I asked someone behind a counter how to get to our B&B, and received directions.

First, we had to walk in the direction I had suggested right at the beginning of our meanderings. Then we had to cross a road and walk over a bridge and under a train line. We had not seen that path on our travels because it was behind a building. Then we had to walk up the hill until we saw a pub with a white bear on it. We did that with no problem other than getting tired legs. Then we were supposed to see our road lead away from that area. There were several roads that were labelled, but none of them were the one we were looking for, and there were two that weren't labelled. One was the same road we were already on, so we thought 'it can't be that one.' So we took what we figured, by process of elimination, was the road we wanted. We climbed and climbed and climbed, looking for the B&B. After about ten minutes of this, we FINALLY found a sign for the road we were on. And it was the wrong road. So we turned left, and left again and found ourselves on the right road. About 30 houses or more too far up it. So we walked back down the hill and found the B&B. From there we could see that the road we were on was the road we had been on before, the one with the pub with the white bear. Apparently it just changes name randomly half way along. Confusing, huh?

That night we ate food we had bought at the co-op and watched TV, because we were tired.

The next morning after a delicious B&B breakfast we went down to the bus terminal because I wanted to see about busses to Glastonbury. I really wanted to see Glastonbury but after looking at the bus timetables and inquiring at the TI, it turned out that it was too difficult to go there for a few hours without a car, so I didn't get to go. I bought a souvenir book of Glastonbury from the TI, but that is no where near the same . . .

Then we went to the Roman Baths. What a wonderful museum! It was actually worth the 10 pounds entry fee. Really, a very interesting museum and you get the chance to wander around in a 2000 year old bath house and shrine afterwards. The whole place has misty, aromatic air from the spring water. I won't talk too much about the baths, because it is something that has to be seen to be appreciated. But I will talk about something Gillian and I saw while in one of the original rooms. Gillian said to me "Look!" So I looked where she was pointing. On the other side of a barrier, on the stones of an old Roman floor was what I at first thought were big clumps of creamy mould. I said "Ewww," but then Gillian pointed at the ceiling. It was quite dark in there, but I could just see long thin white tendrils hanging down. I thought "Oh, that's disgusting, why don't they clean that?" and then realised what I was REALLY looking at. To give you a hint, 'Bath stone' is a limestone. Yes, they were 2000 year old baby stalactites and stalagmites. Groovy.

The Pump Room was closed for renovations, so we didn't get to see it. So we went and had an expensive tourist lunch while we thought of what to do next. Being winter in England, it was drizzling, so we did not want to go for a walk. So we got on the tourist bus. We were thinking of doing the hop-on-hop-off thing, but because it was rainy nowhere looked appealing, and the driver did not look inclined to stopping anyway. So after an hour of driving around Bath we ended up where we started. Although the look-see had been interesting, we had paid 9.50 for the privilege, so it was quite a rip-off.

Then I had to go to the loo, but it turns out that as well as lacking street signs, Bath also lacks public loos. So we went into a pub and had a drink each so I could go. After that we went to a mall we had seen from the bus, and I bought a nice amber pendant and a silver whatchamacallem. Collar? Whatever. Then we went back to the B&B and ate Co-op food again because we are young and poor.

The next day we went on a bus tour. We got to see a cute Cotswold village called Castle Combe, eat lunch in a village called Lacock, see Silbury Hill and visit the Avebury and Stonehenge monuments.

It was a misty morning, so Castle Combe had a strange atmosphere to it. It felt very still, like something was about to happen. After Castle Combe we went to Avebury. On the way we stopped to see Silbury Hill. It was still drizzling and misty, so we didn't get out of the bus, but I was nevertheless very impressed. That huge, ancient man-made hill looming up out of the mist is a powerful sight.

We quickly moved on to Avebury itself. Over the centuries, the residents of Avebury village have taken down an awful lot of the monument while caught up in religious panic. The stones that are standing now are the ones that had been too strong for the villagers to break up so were buried instead. Also, the fact that there is a village slap-bang in the middle of the monument is rather off-putting. But still, it is easy to see how magnificent the monument must have once been. I was as fascinated with the henge part of the monument (which was huge) as the standing stones.

The tour guide told us an interesting story at Avebury. Apparently, the huge central stone of the south circle had been present until only a few hundred years ago. But then the Church had ordered the villagers to remove the stone immediately, the reason being that it was thin and very tall (6m tall, I think) and the Church does not like huge Pagan phallic monuments, not one bit. So the villagers broke the stone up, and built a small church out of it. Then the tour guide pointed to the church in question. "Look at the shape of the windows," he said. So we looked at the tall, thin gothic-inspired windows. And the tour guide said "Now, isn't that just an example of the Church shooting itself in the foot?"

Next we went to Lacock. The tour guide dropped us off outside a pub so we could have lunch. When we went inside, there were very few locals and the food was expensive, so Gillian walked back out. I felt kind of embarrassed doing that, but the pub down the road had lots of locals, a better menu and was cheaper, so it was a good decision. I had an absolutely delicious steak-and-ale pie. With it, I had vegetables and lemon meringue pie. Gillian had the same pie, but had a salad and apple crumble with it. (BTW the same thing was happening with the breakfasts. We would be asked what drink we wanted; I would say tea, and Gillian would say coffee. When we were asked what toast we wanted, I would say brown, and Gillian would say white. We are such opposites). After lunch, we went for a wander while taking pictures then got back on the bus and we all went to Stonehenge.

I picked up an audio guide at Stonehenge, and was listening to it as well taking pictures. Gillian got grouchy, growled at me and stalked off. (She apologised about it later, saying she needed to be alone while experiencing the spiritualness of the area or something. But then, I left her behind at Avebury when she couldn't be bothered hiking over to see the northern circle). Stonehenge is just Stonehenge; it is not much more interesting than seeing the photos. It must have had an amazing atmosphere in the past, though. That open space, the barrows on the horizon. You can almost feel it today, if you use your imagination. But those noisy roads and the visitors centre ruin it. Just RUIN it.

After that we headed back to Bath. We nearly died on the way. Some idiots in two cars drove into one of those places by the side of the road trucks can stop to let cars pass, and then one of the cars pulled straight back out into the road A COUPLE OF METRES IN FRONT OF OUR MINI BUS. . . . . WHILE GOING SLOWER THAN THE MINI BUS! It was close, it was very close.

But we got back to Bath alive, which was good. Then my Credit Card was promptly eaten by a cash machine. Probably because I hadn't used it for a year and a half and suddenly started using it to buy plane tickets and hotel bookings from the internet, as well as buying several different currencies of cash in several different airports. I'm not a thief, I'm me I swear!

We didn't go out that evening either. We were both having money troubles, and there were some interesting programmes on TV. That night was either the first episode of Life On Mars, or the second-to-last episode of Lost, so Gillian had something she wanted to watch. It was definitely the night that a programme with Richard Dawkins talking to various radical religious people was on. That was interesting TV, but it made me so riled up to watch! Especially the evangelical guy telling one of the worlds leading scientists that he was not only wrong, but arrogant and probably evil, and then yelling at him "Get out of here before I call the police! You called my children animals!" Dawkins said it took him a while to understand the 'animals' remark, but then realised that the guy meant the 'primate' status of the human race. No matter how many people tell them that mud-slinging just makes them look more like monkeys than the rest of people, and therefore supports scientific theory, they don't listen.

Anyway, enough of trying to puzzle out strange people. The next day we went back to MK. By the same long, boring route. There was another interesting episode of Top Gear to watch, and that was it. That evening we took it easy. And because I just did a word count and realised I have written over 2000 words, I will stop.

And continue later with Part 7 - The time in which I recuperated and ate Chinese food (which will be a short post, I promise).
Oh, and I had formatting problems with this post, even before I started putting pictures in, so if it is not displaying properly on your computer, please leave a comment.