Trip Review: Stonehenge and Bath

As part of my program I am given two weekend trips, one of which I just went on and was to Stonehenge and Bath.

To get to Stonehenge we took a coach (bus) about an hour and a half south west of London. We passed many of the outer areas of London like Chiswich and some nice British countryside. When we got to Stonehenge we were given a pass to the information center and site and an audio guide. To actually get to the stones we walked a few minutes to the main center and then took a little bus for about ten minutes, the stones are separated from the visitors by a “fence” which is really just some string in small metal spikes. This doesn’t inhibit your view at all and you can walked around about 2/3 of the stones; there is an area you can’t go. The stones themselves were cool to look at; the guide was moderately informative. I heard that the information center was a good place to see, but we were only given an hour and a half to see the stones, and some of my friends wanted to eat, so we didn’t get a chance.

After Stonehenge we drove another hour or so to Bath. The little town had beautiful, large houses made of a sort of pale yellow stone which is quarried locally. All of the houses are made in the same stone and Georgian style. It is very pretty to look at especially the royal crescent building and the circus. We then took a tour of the roman baths which are very cool to see, but the museum set up isn’t very good; you go up and down and side to side, winding around the building. The museum is under construction, so it may be more intuitive later. After this my group and another two hours to wander around town; we went by the river and wandered through the streets, but it appeared to us that bath was very small; we were able to walk around all of the shop area in less than 20 minutes; the rest of town appeared to be houses.  We then stopped into a pub to kill some time and drank some of the local cider which was very good. We then popped by a candy shop in their market, and then headed toward the buses.

Overall, both of the trips were very nice to see; though I wish Bath had more of a quiet, spa town fell. As it was bath was packed with people, cars, and modern shops like Starbucks and Pret.