Sarah's adventures in Brighton

Yup, I know it has been a while since the Brighton trip; life got busy.
Unfortunately  photos inside the pavilion are not permitted; but let me try to describe it.   However opulent you think you can imagine it is more so.
Decoration is on every surface; and golden dragons and wyverns.  I loved the 10' tall golden snaky dragons which were coiled to tuck the curtains into when they were drawn back.  And for dragons I forgive a lot of excess ... vulgar? hell yes, but it is so over the top it almost works.  When we left it was in a haze of bling overload. Though only one room was truly uncomfortable - the red reception room, which was so overwhelmingly scarlet that I fled through it in a hurry. what a way to depress pretensions of visitors you don't want!
Simon was amazed how small the grand piano was.  I was blown away by the iron pillars in the kitchen topped with cast iron palm leaves, in the semblance of trees.  I doubt servants appreciated dust catchers out of reach over where they were preparing food! 

the riding house

and this is the way in to the kitchen complex...

 And some details of the decoration

Sarah's adventures in Bath part III

Day three we went to Pulteney Bridge which in the Regency was the new bridge.  Unfortunately while there my camera ceased working - turned out to be a faulty connection in the lens, not the camera - phew! the cheapest half - and not worth repairing.  Whilst consulting the very nice man in the camera shop near the Abbey I was told that there are tunnels under Bath and that there is a bricked up one in the cellar of that shop.  Anyone who knows more, I would dearly love to know.

 Some back alleys which I don't think have changed much, including Sally Lunn's cake shop

Looking to the downs on the other side of the river

Looking down into Parade, once St James's gardens

 Looking up Gt Pulteney St past Laura Place towards Sydney Gardens

 Looking across the river at the site of the old assembly rooms

pulteney bridge

the tunnel under the bridge with access to the cellars of the shops on it.

and after my camera died, thanks to Anne Seebaldt who took these from the city side of the river:

The Regency Miss's Survival Guide to Bath

The book I have been researching for is out, and has been described by author Susana Ellis as 'Meticulously Researched'.  It's almost all from primary sources, local newspapers and extant period guidebooks.  All you need to know about travelling to Bath and living there ... between 1810 and 1820.

The Regency Miss’s Survival Guide to Bath is now available!  This book is written for Regency writers and readers alike who love the romance of Bath. It is not a history of Bath, nor its famous sons, it is a book about the everyday things a Regency Heroine might get up to, and what entertainments were available for her delight.

I laboured long and hard to put hyperlinks in the kindle version, I hope I have covered every link needed!

Paperback

UK https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1688066799

US https://www.amazon.com/dp/1688066799

Kindle

UK https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B07WZJJYFS

US https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07WZJJYFS

Sarah's adventures in Bath part I

Well, here I am recovering from that lovely working holiday!  Three days in Bath was not enough to see everything, but was quite enough to exhaust me, especially anticipating a day trip to Brighton.  Well, I haven't got around to sorting out the Brighton photos yet, but I have sorted out the Bath ones.

I have to say, nothing I had read prepared me for the idea that the main bathhouse and the pump room were in a paved plaza by the cathedral, with an arcade at the other end of the cathedral and beyond that was once, as I understand it, the White Hart Hotel.  Now I really have an idea of how noisy it must have been - even without thinking of the dozens of coaches coming and going at all hours of day and night.

We stayed at what would have been something of the 'wrong' end of town, in Green Park, which used to be King's Mead.

It was a lovely apartment, deep squishy leather sofa and wide TV if you like that sort of thing as well as looking so delightfully period.  Jack, the landlord was very helpful and I thoroughly recommend taking an apartment here if you do stay in Bath - Sainsbury's is just up the road and if you are able bodied it's about 10 minutes walk or less to the centre of the city.  Failing that, the taxis are very good and the bus service extensive.

So, the centre of Bath:

the old Christopher hotel on the left, guildhall on the r

the guildhall

the abbey church

guildhall

this and the next two are the ladder-climbing angels on the Abbey

the west front of the abbey looking towards the pump room

more angels

they go all the way up

thanks to Anne and Michelle for coming with me!

from the other side of the arcade

from the abbey looking towards the site of the White Hart, on the left the pump room

the pump; yes, I drank the waters - twice!  it's not as nasty as I was expecting, a bit metallic and salty with a whiff of sulphur, certainly nothing like as nasty as coca cola

Thanks to Anne Seebaldt for taking the photo

the pump room; the alcove for the musicians at the far end and the alcove overlooking the King's Bath where the pump is situated on the left

looking from pump room to baths

looking from baths to pump room

the bath entrance

the baths with abbey in background

under the arcade

the notorious inscription, 'water better than wine'

round the back - the entrance from opposite the white hart 

the king's bath

More another time - the Assembly Room, the Royal Crescent, the Circus and poking around back alleys