After breakfast, we set off for a full-day excursion to the city of Bath, dubbed "the most elegant city in England". Perhaps one of the most popular residents of Bath is 18th century novelist, Jane Austen, whose life's work now resides in the Jane Austin Centre in downtown Bath. The entire city of Bath is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
After a driving tour of the city, we stopped to visit the Royal Crescent, a crescent-shaped row of 30 townhouses designed by architect John Wood, Jr. and built between 1767 and 1774. Currently 10 are still full-size townhouses; 18 have been split into apartments of various sizes; one is the No. 1 Royal Crescent museum, and The Royal Crescent Hotel & Spa, which lies at the center of the crescent, is made up of No. 15 and No. 16 and rents for close to £1000 per night ($1300 U.S. dollars)!
Next, we visited the Roman Baths, one of the most preserved Roman ruins in the world. Built in AD70 over hot springs, the site contains thousands of archaeological finds from pre-Roman and Roman Britain and the water is said to contain mystical healing properties.
We wrapped up our visit to bath with...well, a bath of sorts, as the we encountered the first rainstorm of our trip thus far!
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