England: Oxford

Next we moved our base to Oxford; very many tourists. Most of the colleges have stiff ticket prices. The one place we actually were willing to pay, Radcliffe Camera library, was long booked up by Harry Potter fans. In the end, we managed to walk in a few colleges and attended evensongs at Christ Church and Magdalen College Chapel.

We stayed four minutes walking distance from the Ashmolean Museum and ended up going there everyday. Overall, highlights turned out to be the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, truly a cathedral to science, and Pitt Rivers Museum, highly unusual.

Oxford seemed very different from what I remembered from my brief visit to Cambridge 30 years ago.

Radcliffe Camera


The Main Quadrangle of All Souls College at the University of Oxford (1st below) and All Souls College Chapel (2nd).




The University Church of St Mary the Virgin


The Pissarro Gallery, Ashmolean Museum


The Pre-Raphaelite "Return of the Dove to the Ark" (1851) by Sir John Everett Millais, Ashmolean Museum


The Shrine of Taharqa, Ashmolean Museum


Cornmarket Street, the busy pedestrian shopping street.


Looking back at Magdalen College Chapel after Evensong.


"A Feature of Modern Life" - Every night, delivery guys hung out below our hotel window. Nice.


The not-so-busy Friday Morning Commute.


We happened to be in Oxford on Graduation Weekend.


The exterior of the Oxford University Museum of Natural History does not prepare you for the amazing interior.








Not to mention the adjacent Pitt Rivers Museum.






One evening we grabbed some street food at Najar's Place, an Oxford institution.






We walked by this timber-beamed building at least once each day.


We attended Evensong at Christ Church Cathedral, entering beneath the Tom Bell Tower.


Students Entering Tom Quad for a "May Ball".


Finally, Sunday Cyclists.

Wales: Cardiff

From Bath we made a detour to Cardiff. In the 1800s south Wales coal turned Cardiff into the largest coal export port in the world, and the largest city in Wales. Cardiff became the official capital of Wales in 1955, home of the Welsh Parliament and Wales Millennium Centre, and a huge barrage that turned tidal mud flats into a lake.

Still I found Cardiff rather underwhelming. On the train to Cardiff, a fellow passenger said to us "I'm not sure why you are bothering with Cardiff". I now agree with him.

Leaving Bath Spa Railway Station on a Great Western Railway (GWR) train.


From city center Cardfiff, it's a short train ride to Cardiff Bay and the iconic Wales Millennium Centre. There was a theatre show that night, and although the weather was quite chilly and breezey, folks were streaming in.




Looking to the now-non-tidal Cardiff Bay, and farther to the like-a-dam Barrage.






Cardiff is the capital of Wales. The parliament meets in the Senedd Building at Cardiff Bay.


In front of the Senedd Building is the striking Merchant Seafarers's War Memorial.


Nearby is the Pierhead Building (1897), originally the headquarters of the Cardiff Railway Company. Again let me say it was pretty darn chilly when we visited Cardiff Bay.




There are several old dry docks around Cardiff Bay. They used to provide services for coaling ships.




Cardiff Bay Railway Station (Bae Caerdydd)


Back in Cardiff, the Cardiff Market was very photogenic.






The Brutalist Westgate Street NCP Car Park (1974)


Principality Stadium


High St. Arcade

England: Bath

Bath, named after its 1st century CE Roman bath, has the most comprehensible Roman in the whole world. Over the years we have come across dozens of Roman baths of varying sizes. The Bath Roman bath complex, though average in size and state of preservation, is very well presented, giving visitors a good idea of the original baths, undoubtedly funded by hefty admission prices.

Bath city center itself is mostly Georgian, built from the profits of plantations and India and opium. We had a beautiful walk on part of the Bath Skyline Walk, bagging National Trust Prior Park Landscape Garden (the house is now a college) along the way. The whole parcel was the direct result of 1/3 ownership of a Jamaica plantation. We are beginning to know English gardens. At the same time, I'm realizing that English gardens themselves are direct products of the Empire of slavery and colonialism.

The Roman Baths are in the city center, right next to Bath Abbey. The Great Bath is the highlight of course. Wikipedia: The Great Bath was discovered in 1871 by city architect Charles Davis, but the spectacular columned and open-air structure you see above it today was added by the Victorians in the 1890s.










Adjacent to the ruins of the Roman Thermae is the ancient Roman Temple of Minerva. Recovered fragments of the pediment are on display




The Temple of Minerva Courtyard has been partially reconstructed "in place" as well, with an elevated walkway for us visitors, and a video showing what the courtyard may have looked like 2000 years ago.






The Baths were much more than the Great Bath and the Temple of Minerva. There was also a swimming bath (1st and 2nd below), and a caldarium hot bath (3rd)






East Baths Sauna with Video Projections of Bathers


Great example of the "hypocaust" system. Encyclopedia Britannica: a hypocaust was an ancient Roman heating system that circulated hot air beneath a raised floor to warm the rooms above.


Bath Abbey with Busker


The River Avon runs through the center of Bath, crossed by the famous Pulteney Bridge, and regulated by the Pulteney Weir




There is also the Kennet and Avon Canal.


We visited the two amazing 18th Century terraces (row houses): The Circus (1st, 2nd, and 3rd below) and The Crescent (4th).








Pétanque (Boules) - Queen Square


Our second day in Bath we did the Skyline Walk (great views down to Bath), with a detour to Prior Park Landscape Garden and its scenic lake and bridge.