Holidays in south-west England August 08 to 22, 2009
Tuesday August 18
Bath (Aquae Sulis) - the reason why we spent our second week in Wiltshire. I've been dying to see the Roman baths for ages.
Now here we are, and just barely after they opened, which is why there are so few tourists in the photos...

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The main bath would have been under a high roof at the time - and as a result the water would remain clear and not breed algae.
To the right is the source basin which you will later see from two more angles as we proceed with our visit.
The source would not have been accessible in Roman times, but in later centuries, when the water level was higher (see the marks on the wall), monks would help sick people in there who would then sit up to the neck into the water in those niches along the wall.
The water is a constant 46,5°C by the way.
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A model of the baths and the temple of Minerva Sulis - we tend to forget that Roman buildings were painted in colours and were not just boring white marble all the time.
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one of the mosaics and the open area before the temple
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the source again, the water coming into and flowing out of the bath complex
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an old bench in one of the niches around the main bath
lead pipe leading to the "jacuzzi" bath (below) and the floor around the main bath
Though usually people would wear wooden shoes (because of the hot floor in the hypocaust-heated chambers), the wear of the stones indicates that they were also walked by people with nail-soled shoes (such as soldiers).
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the "jacuzzi" bath and one of the bath chambers where you can see the hypocaust heating system very well
(you'll see a lot of those in Britain, not only in baths, must be the climate)
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more bath chambers, the main bath, and the round one to the right is I believe the cold bath, that would be the frigidarium
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more hypocaust, the main bath, and again the source
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left to right: the cold bath, hypocaust heating, the Pump Room entrance, the source basin seen from the Pump Room and the only water fountain where you can get drinking water (also in the Pump Room)
The Pump Room, adjacent to the Roman Baths, is now a restaurant/tea room, but you can go in a look at it and get a glass of source water to drink. It has a very special taste.
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We couldn't resist the unique experience of taking a bath in the same source water as the Romans did - at the modern Thermal Spa of Bath, where of course we didn't take our camera, so here's someone else's photo from the rooftop pool with a view of Bath Abbey next door.
click to enlarge
some views from Bath (the entire town is on the UNESCO World Heritage list)
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Pulteney Bridge is said to be one of only four bridges in the world with houses (another one obviously being the Ponte Vecchio in Florence)
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Bath architecture: The Circus by John Wood Sr. and Jr., Brock Street leading from there to the Royal Crescent, both by John Wood Jr.
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Our landlady takes me to the cows in the outlying pastures, and we see some deer (and bunnies and a hare, but those were gone even faster).
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These are the teenage girls of the Frisian dairy herd - heifers who are about a year old. The young lady in red is just the same breed as the rest of them. And they all tried to lick me.
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