http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Europe , United Kingdom , England , Somerset en-us Tue, 29 Dec 2009 16:53:47 +0000 Tue, 29 Dec 2009 16:53:47 +0000 We made it. After 2 flights and 1 bus and 0 sleep we finally arrived in Bath at 1100 am. With no hotel to check into yet we stored our bags and set off to see the sights. We visited the Bath Abby and the Royal Crescent and Royal Circus previously only seen in our architecture books The Royal Crescent is also one of Johnny Depp's homes We also took a walking tour sponsored by the City of http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-440536.html Throughout my travels Irsquove always had the urge to ascend to the highest geographical points in the areas Irsquove visited. Since Bathrsquos city centre sits in the river valley of seven nearby hills this urge arose when I arrived. This morning I decided to climb one of these hills as part of one of my shorter training runs.I headed to the north end where there were many buildings on the http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-433015.html I left Belfast early this morning en route to Bath England. After a flight to London Heathrow a train to a station near Heathrow another train to Twyford or something similar to that another one to Reading then a final one to Bath I finally arrived this afternoon.Due to its hot springs Bath is a renowned spa town which is located near Stonehenge my real reason for coming here. The city i http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-432740.html Today we were supposed to go into London but we kind of woke up late and the weather was if so we decided to go visiting places closer to home. First we set of to a little village called Castle Combe although its called Castle Combe there's no castle but it is considered England's most picturesque villages in England. It really was a beautiful village guess what the sun came out as soon as http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-430740.html I've not done a huge amount of travel around this country that I live in so I decided to change that by taking a weekend trip to Bristol and Bath.It was a bit of a class trip as I was going with four friends I went to school with Davies Gkee and Kelley who have all appeared on this blog before and another one of my old school friends Mitra.I had heard good things about Bristol that it is a l http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-428387.html The lovely town of Bath sort of I am not joking about needing a bath. I am not the best smelling of people on a good day.We are a bit behind on blogs as we have been having trouble coordinating battery power and free internet.We actually visited Bath ahwile ago but it was so awesome we thought a belated post was due.The place is called Bath because it is centered around some old Roman bathing p http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-426476.html Wednesday 29th JulyA day in Bath........in the rainAfter a long day out yesterday we plan only a short run of 15 or so miles to Bath today.There are enough attractions to see in the city to keep us occupied for the day.Howeverthe prospects for the day is rain.....again.With this factor in mind and the need for Gretchen to get a haircut and colour highlights we shall look for a Toni and Guy firs http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-424545.html HelloIt has been a while since we have blogged so this one goes back to June in the middle of the summer which seems such a long time ago now. We made the journey for our first summer music festival and what better than braving the elements in the lush fields at Glastonbury. We started off on the Wednesday for the 3 day music festival in order to get a spot in the fields to camp. The journey th http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Glastonbury/blog-420026.html Conquering Heights Shane has been challenging his fear of heights regularly here in Europe. This post is about a few of our high up adventures Part I Cheddar West England We went to Cheddar on an off chance well not really..Meg likes cheese and that decided it. We did get some really lovely cheddar cheese and 5L of cider Meg eagle eye spotted this farm fresh cider shop on the way in. M http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-418457.html Ok so it was nearly Wales and OMG could we see that on the way to Bath Sheep sheep and sheep again Well what can we say really Bath was stunning Gorgeous architecture and of course the Roman Baths absolutely amazing too. The water is very hot and you can even try it To be honest it doesn't taste too lovely but still it's the mineral water from the real Roman Baths http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-415883.html Lets make no mistake about it both Jen and I are festival junkies and Glastonbury 'Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts'or just 'glasto' is the Mecca of festivals this is gonna be goodThe adventure starts in Herne Hill where Tom lives collecting the essential supplies. This includes as much booze as we figure we can physically carry plenty of toilet paper and whatever http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Glastonbury/blog-414404.html WARNINGThis entire blog is likely to be waffle.As yet I have nothing to write about unless you want to hear about my new embroidery project and so I am just practising with this newfangled communication technique. IT WILL hopefully GET BETTER as I actually set off...It is the last day of June 2009 and my last day as a solely European traveller Tomorrow the first day of July I strap on my in http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-413685.html Visited the town of Bath known since Roman times for the hot springs. The Roman Baths were closed but walked around the whole town for several hours. Bath is truly one of Europe's highlights as a travel destination.The weather has been perfect. Well Hot. That's quite unusual for this part of England at this time of year. Luckily Sharm's car has AC. The AC in Stu's car was not working and we wi http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-413586.html And Loving Every MinuteAfter a much more comfortable train ride to Salisbury I head for the main attraction of the town... Salisbury Cathedral. With Britain's tallest spire at over 120m it was built in the 13th Century and miraculously survived the bombings of WWII unscathed. Later on after talking to German pilots it was revealed that they were under strict orders not to touch the Cathedral http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-412577.html We started the morning visiting Glastonbury Abbey. Although it is just ruins you can really imagine what it might have been like in its time. It was a serene place. We then travelled to Wells. We saw the Cathedral there with its beautiful faade and its amazingly famous scissor arches. The Bishoprsquos Palace was equally impressive and the wells that the city is named after which apparent http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-411582.html We left Canterbury and made our way to Winchester. When we set the sat nav for the new route to Winchester we realised the reason we were having trouble yesterday was because it was set for walking routes and not for driving. We encountered some difficulty on our way as there were road closures along the motorways which set us back by about an hour limiting our time in Winchester if we wanted http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Glastonbury/blog-411574.html I woke up at 730 on the dot because Johns daughter Stephanie was up getting ready for school. I had to get ready because I was supposed to leave when John left to take his son to the dentist to make things easy. They made me some toast and tea and gave me some cereal as well. Wicked I even got to make myself a sandwhich to take with me. It really impressed me so much. The hospitality given to a st http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-407027.html A weekend of camping and walking in the wilds of Exmoor May 2009. http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Exmoor/blog-406637.html After the asceticism and equanimity of the Vipassana experience I make my way to Glastonbury to celebrate one of the most important festivals in the Celtic calendar Beltane. Beltane is the festival of love of fertility of sexuality and the sacred marriage it is a time when the God and Goddess meet in sacred union and dance the wild sensual dance of creation. Flowers and trees are blossoming http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Glastonbury/blog-397266.html While driving to Bath I stop at Cleeve Abbey which was a Cistercian abbey founded around 1190. Cistercians were named because of their clothes of undyed wool white monks after Citeaux in Burgandy. Their day beginning at 2AM consisted of 8 or 9 periods of worship and 4 hours of work before retiring at 7pm. Theoretically they followed the values of St Benedict which was to live a simple life http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/United-Kingdom/England/Somerset/Bath/blog-397202.html