Great Expectasia: Bath and Area

Did you know that Bath, England was named because there was a BATH THERE?? I only learned that about a year ago. It was a natural hot spring bath, from the Roman times, and it's still there. This weekend, we wanted to check out Bath. We decided to stay a bit in the countryside, because we love space, soccer and the Cotswolds.

Saturday we got up and tried to leave early. I'm really the only one in my family that thrives in that atmosphere. The car GPS (SatNav here) said two hours. Of course it took three, because it's England! Construction! Traffic! Who knows what else!

We finally arrived, and our air bnb host let us throw our things inside before we set off for lunch and a hike. I'm my dad's daughter, so I don't like to leave all of our things in the car when we hike...We went for the most amazingly beautiful and delicious lunch at Merkin's Farm Cafe. GORGEOUS scenery, and all were happy (other than Sam).

We drove from there to a gorgeous hike. Shorter and less elevation than Wales. We learned our lesson. Though the hike was only 4.4 miles, I luckily made a wrong turn, so it turned into more like 5-5.5, which is better for me. It was woods. River. GORGEOUS little town (Castle Combe), church, EVERYTHING. Absolutely beautiful hike. Minimal complaints. Ice cream in the middle helped.

So many tiny snails on leaves

and ladybirds

and red bugs!

and caterpillars!

this dog joined the family photo

what if this were your house!? how gorgeous. I'm in

these two. talking. ALLLL DAY

horses! All sorts

dad. the holder of all waters. the distributor of all snacks

sam. walking well behind the rest of us but happy when they finally get out there.

castle combe, but the pictures don't capture how cute it was

photo credit, koby

definitely don't go into the church with us. just sit here.

short little door on an old old house

what a beautiful plant, no?!

wild garlic everywhere. koby smelled it.

more snails and tiny flowers

We went to the air bnb to chill for a bit, and then we headed to a pub from the 1700s in Corsham. Food was ok. Atmosphere was super cool - OLD. And the town was filled with peacocks all over the place! We heard them and then saw one on a roof and another in a school yard.

this was just so british. on the streets of corsham

After a lovely night of sleep, the kids wanted to sleep in, and the weather looked iffy, so they slept, and I did work. We finally headed off to Bath and found lunch (Sam found all of the dogs in the restaurant). By the time we finished lunch, we had about ten minutes before it POURED LIKE CRAZY. Luckily in a place like Bath, there are lots of covered areas. We took cover under an old overhang by the river and also in Waitrose. Then we walked all around the city - dodging huge rain storms. It is such a cute little city with GORGEOUS architecture.

Koby said he was taking a pic of me and Matt, but when we saw the roll, this is what we found.

cool area on the river

RAIN, but it was beautiful

The Abbey. But we're a bit churched out, so we just enjoyed it from the outside.

the baths. was a bit crowded, but cool.

Then Elie chose a pub for dinner. We ate a lot.

Today morning we woke up early, because I was traffic-phobic coming off the long weekend, and also it looked like rain the afternoon. Also, Elie is going on a school camping trip tomorrow, and he wanted some time at home. We found a hike that is on our way home. It went around the largest stone circle in the world (what? what did they do with all those huge stones!?) and off into the countryside. It was GORGEOUS. We even saw a Neolithic mound. Again - what did they do with the mounds??