Day Trip #1

Wednesday (1/20)
My first day trip! Today was exhausting but so fabulous. We traveled by coach and saw Stonehenge, Salisbury, and Bath. I loved all three places, and I may consider moving to Bath when I grow up. We were at Stonehenge in the morning and it was snowing! Beautiful but deadly cold. I was expecting something kind of small but it was bigger than I expected. Very cool. I wanted to try to climb the rocks but they wouldn’t let us get closer.

Next stop was Salisbury Cathedral – an amazing old gothic cathedral with a very tall spire. Sadly they were doing construction on a lot of it (outside and inside) because it’s the tourist off-season and because the Olympics are coming to London in 2 years! Lots of England is preparing by prettying itself up. So lots of construction. Anyway, inside the cathedral was very dark; lots of stained glass and no sunlight to shine through it! There were lots of adorable schoolchildren touring, they’re so cute! The cathedral had medieval altars and tombs and was beautiful… except for the big creepy ‘death’ angels hanging. I love how it’s still standing strong after hundreds and hundreds of years.

Last but not least (and my favorite!) was the city of Bath. The whole city is old and gorgeous. The famous ancient Roman baths (hot springs) are in the center. They’ve been a sacred place for over 2,000 years (first discovered by the Celtics before the Romans invaded). There were ruins of the Roman temple around it, and a museum next to the baths. The actual water in the baths is nasty-looking, green, steaming, and bubbling. The water’s rather toxic, so people aren’t supposed to touch it. Afterwards we got glasses of “purified” hot mineral water from the baths. It’s supposed to be “healing water” but tasted like death. Specifically like hot metal, fish, and rocks. Not so tasty. The baths were amazing though! Especially all the ancient architecture and artifacts around it.

We almost fell in..

The water was foul.

Bath Abbey (cathedral) was really pretty, as well as (Jane Austen’s) Assembly Rooms, but I loved exploring the city itself, just wandering and going camera-crazy! All the buildings, streets, houses (we found Nicholas Cage’s house), and the Royal Crescent were stunning and gorgeous. I took 101 pictures in Bath alone! Here some are my favourites…