A Bed in Bath, and Beyond

Come on, you love the title of this post - admit it. I can't take credit - my friend Steve used it in the subject line of an email he sent me the other day. The city of Bath is about an hour or so train ride west of London. I stayed from Tuesday until Sunday. The city is famous for - and obviously named for - its Roman baths. In addition to visiting the baths and accompanying museum, I visited Stonehenge - a quick one-hour tour bus ride away. No, these activities did not take five days to do. Spent a good amount of time just chilling out and taking a break from sightseeing.

I liked Stonehenge, and the drive out there too, which took us through Salisbury Plain. There are a lot of British military bases on Salisbury Plain, and as a result you see the unusual road sign "Tank Crossing". And you think hitting a deer would damage to your vehicle. As for Stonehenge, I think I had lowered my expectations a little, expecting it to be overly touristy. It was very cool though. Had the Spinal Tap song "Stonehenge" running through my head part of the time, though.

Bath was my first experience of staying in a hostel on this trip: it was fine, though it was a bit of an adjustment at first. It is a great way to meet people, of course. One evening, a guy staying at the hostel, Alen - a Slovenian who was just starting a business exporting Land Rovers to Sri Lanka - took me out for a spin in the countryside outside of Bath in a newly acquired refurbished Land Rover. Thank god he had a GPS. He wanted to take it off-roading in a farmer's field, but I was able to convince him that that might not be the best idea. Alen also owns a dive shop in Sri Lanka, where he lives half the year. He successfully combines the look of a dive shop-owner/surfer with the wearing of a sarong (which are commonly worn by men in Sri Lanka). He's invited me to visit him in Slovenia. And Sri Lanka too, I think. We'll see.

Sunday I was off to Cornwall, specifically the seaside town of St. Ives. I booked a place for three nights - it's a hostel, but in truth it has more of a guest house feel - only two rooms: one four-bed and one two-bed. A really great place that just opened a few weeks back. I like it - and St. Ives - so much, I've decided to stay 'til Friday.