Bath and beyond

March 18, 2012, 7:53 p.m.

After we took the train out of London, we disembarked in Basingstoke, where we had a Fiat reserved at the local Budget Rent-a-Car. We'd booked the car so far out of the city on the recommendation of everyone who has ever been to London: you do not want to drive there. Ever, ever. That could not be more true. In fact, I was terrified just walking in London. The cars, they’re so fast, and they’re coming at you from the opposite direction you expect. In the States you kind of watch left and glance right, but if you do that over here you will get yourself smushed. My heart raced every time we approached an intersection, and I got into the habit of booking it across like a total spaz, even if we had a green walk signal. I found it a satisfactory way to handle things.

But now we were out of the city and had to participate in UK traffic from an actual motor vehicle. Sh*t just got real.

The first hour or two on the road was a heart attack a minute for me, but Thayer—ever as cool as a cucumber—handled the learning curve with his usual grace under pressure while I hyperventilated and squawked like a strangled chicken. These roundabouts. Only the devil could have created something so horrifying.

We made our way west through the lush green English countryside and wound up foregoing Stonehenge for Avebury, another circle of ancient megaliths, only bigger and accessible, rather than roped off. We wandered among the giant stones, some of them tipped and balanced on one corner buried in the ground, and learned how the purpose was for one central stone to cast shadows on each of the outer stones at various points in the year, kind of like a yearly sundial. The henge (circle) at Avebury is so wide, it’s the only one to have had a village built within it.

From there it was off to Bath, where we spent several hours touring an ancient Roman bath with an audio guide. The amount that was able to be uncovered and excavated is most spectacular: the bath itself with its columns and even its water, the stone staircases, the giant hunks of rock carved with ornate designs of gods and goddesses, and the curses! Ancient Romans who were cheesed off at other ancient Romans would carve their curses on a thin sheet of lead, roll it up and toss it in the fountain so that the goddess of the bath, Sulis Minerva, would take care of it for them.

Throughout the tour they have pictures and models and even 360-degree digital views of what the bath would have been like in its heyday, so you can envision it against the decrepit ruins in front of you. All told, I found the whole thing quite creepy. Thayer did not share this opinion, but I had some low sinister music playing unbidden through my mind the whole time. Something about how it used to be a bright and expansive open-air structure for worship and play, and now it’s a mass of underground ruins, its inhabitants now only whispers of ghosts. Despite being thoroughly creeped out, I was also thoroughly enthralled, and I’d happily go back to pore over all the parts I missed due to time constraints.

From Bath we continued west into Wales, so I will end this post here, as Wales will be quite a mouthful. Next post up very shortly!