Had a lovely day in Bath yesterday and enjoyed the bus journey (only £3 each way, which is very good, though it’s over two hours so I wouldn’t be able to do it every day).
It’s weird that there were place names the same as ones near here – there was a Pitchcombe and a Rodborough – and I love the funny names of villages we get here – like Pucklechurch, for example.
I also loved the variety of people on the bus. There were quite a few over-60s making full use of their bus passes – I am really looking forward to getting one of them in a few years – and a mum with two chatty daughters taking them for a little school holiday trip to the leisure centre and shopping centre in Yate, and a busker heading into Bath to play music and make some money and the mother with fibromyalgia on a day trip with her teenager daughter chatting to the woman at the front about their varying aches and pains. I enjoyed seeing cows and sheep wandering on the common and people going for morning runs. On the way back, I mostly read, and dozed a bit.
In Bath, I wandered round enjoying the streets and architecture and stupidly went into the amazing and huge bookshop (Topping & Company) right at the start of the day, and so was carrying around a heavy backpack all day (because, of course I bought a bunch of books). I looked around the Guildhall covered market (more books, but didn’t buy any). I had a lovely lunch of vegan pizza (roasted Mediterranean vegetables, toasted pine nuts, rocket and a drizzle of a basil dressing) and a pint of Korev lager. It was far too much for one person at lunch, but I finished it anyway. I sat on the grass in a park and sketched some of the people enjoying the sun. I went to an art gallery. And I had a vegan salted caramel ice cream (which, sadly, was not brilliant – Jude’s vegan ice cream is the best I have found so far – I should have gone for a sorbet, instead). I sat on benches and listened to buskers and groups of language students and watched tourists taking photos. And took my own photos (do I count as a tourist, I wonder?). I looked in shop windows, though not much in shops (apart from the aforementioned bookshop and also popping into Waterstones to pick up a specifically requested book for Chris, where I somehow managed not to buy any more books for myself).
It was a wonderful day. And sated somewhat my thirst for travel and time off, though only bit. Because it did also remind me how much I need a week or two of that kind of thing and proper break with creative inspiration and wandering narrow streets and soaking up a variety of cultures. I am not sure whether more of this kind of day will help, or whether I should save it up for a proper trip in the autumn. Because going somewhere on my own in the summer holidays, would be very unfair!
