Bath: telling the history

I have heard so many beautiful things about Bath before heading there: beautiful architecture works, a good weekend resort for families and nice countryside views around the town. All these descriptions that I saw online or heard from people raised my expectation for this town. The countryside views along the railway was really calmly for me since I was very used to the crowded city life. Yes, this was a ideal weekend get-away trip as I have imagined before.

The railway station was crowed with all the tourists arriving from around the world and I was a part of them. Later I realized that to explore the town within two days was such a crazy idea. An easy way to get around the city would be to hop on the city-tour bus--a red double deck bus with open seating on the top. I found it pleasant to ride on the second floor and with audio tour provided with eight different languages. Certainly, the bus company was trying to provide the most comfortable and convenient travelling services to attract people. I found the same tour bus running in Oxford and London. Tourism, from this point, has expanded to a greater extent. Despite the different architecture styles between towns, the shops are similar: same department stores and grocery stores, Starbucks,Gap and so on. Ironically myself, who would prefer to explore the unique local shops or farmers' market still enjoyed the convenience to be able to have the cheap McDonald's fast food. I guess I still couldn't escape the globalism path in the end.

The most enjoyable experience that I had here in Bath was the city walking tour offered by the volunteers from the town. These volunteers are honored by the city mayor for their efforts to help people from the outside to get started to know about the city: the history and the people. My tour guide was an retired school principal Chris. In contrast to my previous impressions of tour guides, who were usually rather young and energetic, Chris was more like a teacher with exciting stories to tell.

 We started at the Roman Bath's ruins and walked along the streets of Bath. From the stories that Chris tell, I slowly walked back to history. To imagine the streets, the people and even the atmosphere of living back in the eighteenth century when three city builders (Richard Nash, Ralph Allen and John Wood) started to create what Bath looks like today. I liked Chris' way of telling the history through connecting the dots together by pointing out images and explaining them. Then when I stared at the walls, the windows and even the layout of the streets, I felt that they have lives. They tell histories. It was like a hunting game, in which I found small pieces of evidence and put them back together to get a the whole story.

My journey of exploring the city's history did not stop at the tour from Chris. It continued as I visited the Roman's Bath, in which I got to see the old bath place built by the Romans 2000 years ago. Technologies helped us to repaint the life and some of the architectures thounsands of years ago. I would suggest to visit the museum at night to avoid over-crowed lines sinces the night view of the Roman Bath was even more fascinating and mysterious. Of course, you can have a taste of the hot natural mineral water to see how you enjoy it.

Also, I visited a garden created in the eighteenth century--now called the Prior Park. In the middle of the garden, there was an "eye-catcher" originally designed to attract people's attention. However, seems to my friend and I, we found the swan family and ducks in the pond more interesing.

There was far more to explore in Bath. And I would say it is a good idea to join the free city tour if you are interested in walking around and explore the city.