We got up at 6 am and still had trouble leaving by the scheduled 9 am. The hotel breakfast was fine, but not at all like a home-cooked full English, alas. Perhaps that is still coming! John packed early and had his luggage in the car before I was even out of the shower. He was leaving time to write to his golf partner that he would be missing the next match because of our travel dates.

Highclere Castle wasn’t very far, but we took the “interesting” route. Who needs the M3 when tiny roads through hedgerows will get you there just the same? We were wondering why there were no cars (except the occasional lorry coming right at us!) on this winding path. Perhaps it was the navigation system? When John finally found a proper two-lane road with painted lines (!), he took it! I had my iPad out and was following along on my UK “Map Finder” app. Highclere is on an enormous piece of property and is quite an edifice itself, so of course, it was in the middle of nowhere. Can’t wait to see “Downton Abbey” again after touring the house and strolling through the adjacent countryside. It’s lovely. Sadly, no photography was allowed, so the pictures I have were downloaded, but they do show the tour. The rooms that are used in filming are all labeled and create quite a stir among the many women tourists! The grandest is the Grand Saloon with balconies looking down from all four sides—magnificent. Even more impressive, though, was that this was the family home of the 5th Lord of Carnarvon, who, along with Carter, discovered the Tutankhamen tomb. The story goes that Carnarvon had spent so much on so many fruitless digs that he was in near financial ruin. When Carter convinced him to do one more, Carnarvon acquiesced and …amazingly, the first big check back to him was from a newspaper wanting to cover the story. Carefully moving artefacts took years, but thankfully they were well preserved for us all, and Carnarvon wasn’t ruined, which brings us back to Downton Abbey, where we had sandwiches in the garden and walked a scenic route back to the car. The whole experience was lovely.

Next was an idea I had on a lark. Avebury, the largest stone circle in all of Britain. I read from the Rick Steves book while we traveled. It was only 20 minutes away, involved no “B” roads, and had a big write-up in the book. The site was truly magnificent. The size, mass, and placement of these stones were one part of the whole science of the structure, but I hadn’t expected the stones themselves to be so interesting. There seemed to be faces in many of them, but probably not sculpted, probably just found. There was a pattern, though, with folds for chins and mouths, and suggestions of foreheads and eye sockets. Perhaps I have a vivid imagination, but I thought of Easter Island as we roamed along. And then, the exciting moment— I was waiting in the shade of a particularly large stone (they should all have names) while John wandered off to take pictures from a distance, then moved a bit, then wondered, “Ah!” Something got me in the leg. It was a plant—and could only be one kind of plant. I was stung by a nettle! (Nettles have a history in our family. All the Oregon crowd grew up with them, but I did not. Johnny had been stung when we were in England long ago, and so it was fitting that I should be next. The sting bothered me all day, even after applying Neosporin.) Fun times!

Bath was just another 30 minutes down the road. And “down” is what it was. We rolled down, down, down through a gently winding dual carriage way, around a corner, and there it was. Bath stone is particularly lovely in the late afternoon. We wanted to pull over and start taking pictures of the reddish-yellowish colored buildings, ornate and close together, but kept driving to our location instead. It is a fairly busy town, after all. There were some tricks to getting into our Airbnb. It was like a fortress, involving secret codes that had been sent to us, a fob, keys, and an extra wiggle to open the door. Once inside, it was lovely and worth the wait.

Then, off to tour the town! Bath is a smallish city and very contained. We found dinner just up the hill at a lovely, open-air traditional restaurant. John had beef pie and I had fish ‘n chips. The best parts of dinner were the scenery— we were right next to the theater and right across from the Giggling Squid Plaza— and the people near us. One woman and her adult daughter were from Slovakia, and another darling family with three little boys from Holland. We enjoyed chatting and laughing with them.

After dinner, we went to the Roman Baths to verify that we do indeed have tickets for Sunday morning, then stopped to admire the cathedral with angels on ladders climbing to heaven. We walked past the magic shop where magicians were having a break nearby, then to meet the start of the evening comedy tour. Alas, we decided we’d done enough for one day and so headed back to the apartment. Lovely day.