Breakfast was cereal, half a grapefruit and toast. Not a patch on what I've been having, although the coffee was decent. Probably good to get into the habit of not eating too much since I'll be going home soon.
Did some errands (buying my train ticket etc) then went on the free guided walk of Bath. Had to drop about before the end as I was just so cold and tired I was longing to sit down. Very good tour. Wish I'd been in better shape. Came across these rather strange (muscular!) sheep statues. Not sure why but interesting.
Had lunch at a rather upmarket French place that was doing a 2 course lunch special (Le Flamma, George Street). I had the Alsatian equivalent of antipasto followed by a pizza, washed down with a glass of Alsatian white then an espresso. This cost me the princely sum of just under 12 GBP and the owner/waiter whouldn't let me leave a tip.
Went to the Fashion Museum, which is in the Assembly Rooms. They are much smaller than I had expected. Was a real thrill to see the scene of so many Georgette Heyer novels. Couldn't find anything GH related anywhere in town. The town's favorite author is Jane Austen. Poor GH is far too low-brow to rate a mention. And JA hated Bath!
The Fashion Museum was interesting but had too much of a focus on modern (1960+) clothes. Modern catwalk clothes are fairly much uniformly hideous. I guess older clothes are harder to come by. They had corsets you could try on but you needed someone to lace you up so I had to give it a miss, which was a shame.
After this I tottered down to Bath Abbey. My first, and only, church on this trip. The walls are full of plaques in honour of various people. Took a picture of the one for Beau Nash. Hope the photo will be legible. One of my favorites plaques was to a woman from her husband and children. It goes on at length about how wonderful she was but only gives her initials. It ends up saying there is no need to mention her name, family or station because the people who matter know who she was. Another was from the will of an elderly widow who left her money in trust for the aid of improverished widows of good breeding and character. It basically was an extract from the will, including how much money she left in pounds and shillings to be invested in the "consols" at 3%. At the time of writing the trust had aided some 45 widows to the tune of 25 pounds each. Wonder how much that was worth back then?
After the Abbey I browsed in some shops, buying a newspaper so I could stuff it in my boots to help dry them out, then back to the B&B for a rest. Dined at the Hole in the Wall restaurant (George Street again), whose entrance lived up to its name. Full of courting couples. Had a smoked duck, chorizo and canellini bean salad (beans undercooked) followed by roast lamb rump with potatoes dauphinoise and broad beans. Drank a Spanish temperanillo which was far cheaper and nicer than the Italian wine last night. Huge servings so just had coffee rather than dessert and then home to bed.
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