Hot Springs

Bath (town on the southern edge of the Cotswolds) enjoys possibly the best known hot springs in England (there are plenty of others and visiting them might form the basis of another tour). For now however the objective of the visit was not the hot water so much as a view on what archaeology has revealed about how the Romans developed a bath house and temple enclave (devoted to the goddess Sulis Minerva) around the copious hot water rising from the spring.

The Roman town of Aquae Sulis was 4 metres lower than the level of modern Bath, so what we can see today has been largely excavated underneath the plaza surrounding Bath Abbey.

Bath Abbey from the high level walkway around the baths.

Bath Abbey

A substantial part of the Roman site is under the Abbey itself and will remain untouched for forseeable future.  Even so it is possible to visit the main bath, several components like plunge pools, tepidarium, caldarium, temple steps etc, as well as the rising site of the spring itself.

The main spring at Roman level. The orange line is level to which it was raised in mediaeval times. The spring itself was never 'lost' even though the Roman development around it got leveled and built over (and forgotten about).

Bath, the town, is famously built of warm cream coloured Bath stone and as a result one of the most beautiful cities in England. Town planners have excluded traffic from a large chunk of the city centre making its wide streets into safe pedestrian zones with great street culture, eateries, entertainers (we heard some fabulous musicians), and interesting shops.

Residential Street

The city also operates a very successful Park & Ride system where you park your vehicle in one of the city's large peripheral parking lots and ride into town on one of the buses that ply the loop 10 minutes or so apart. Easy parking,  no traffic jam issues, no arguments about 'turn here' or one way streets. Navigation into and around Bath is complicated by the River Avon which wends its way about the city.

We enjoyed our day in Bath and pootled back to our billet in a little hamlet called Sprithill - delightful country lanes, views across rolling Cotswold countryside.