Bath: a parasol & booklover's bolthole

Hello, dear one. I'm Aimée, a copywriter, solo-mama & crossword lover from Ireland, now living in the Cotswolds. I write seasonal tales about British heritage, landscape & food. Pull up a chair, make your favourite drink and subscribe to read my stories.

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Perhaps, a good starting point is the place that I have called home for the best-part of a decade. Tucked away in the Southern-most edge of the Cotswolds, in the bowl of the Avon Valley is my soul city - Bath. I grew up watching period dramas, so parasols, lace, and disreputable gentleman with 10-thousand-pounds-a-year were all that filled my head. And when it came time to decide where I should go to university, there was only one place for me.

Spend an afternoon pottering around Bath and I dare you not to fall in love with it. Here, the past and present seamlessly flow into each other. You can tuck into a sweet Sally Lunn bun, served in the oldest house in Bath (circa 1482) or ‘take the waters’ at the 2,000 year old Roman Baths. Bath is the only city in the UK to be awarded the prestigious UNESCO World Heritage Site status.

It’s a place of literary pilgrimage too. Jane Austen visited the city frequently, was a resident for several years and partly set two of her novels here (Northanger Abbey & Persuasion). Likewise, Mary Shelley penned Frankenstein while living in Bath. Two houses - both on Gay Street - have been turned into the Jane Austen Centre and the House of Frankenstein where you can dive into Bath’s literary leanings.

Bibliophiles can while away afternoons in the city’s many cosy bookshops. My favourite is Topping & Company - a bookish paradise spread over three floors. The shelves are made from solid oak and the hand-painted gold lettering lets you know if you’re in the philosophy or cookery section. There are ladders to reach the tallest shelves and if you wish to linger a while, you can have free tea or coffee. There’s an old grandfather clock that chimes throughout the day, giving it such a magical feeling. The bookshop always has a rostra of famous literary faces coming to do events. For a mere fiver you can have a glass of red with Margaret Atwood.

Despite there being over 5,000 listed buildings in Bath, the city isn’t a parody of the past. It’s a real, living, breathing place full of independent businesses, restaurants, start-ups and cosy pubs. The city is a patchwork of passageways, secret little nooks, leading you here, there, and everywhere. Blink and you’ll miss corridors of artisan coffee houses, flower stalls, oyster restaurants, and the best cookies in town.

You’ll find all the usual high-street culprits too, but here the pioneering spirit of the independents are stronger than the big boys. (I’m going to write upcoming posts about the best places to eat, drink & shop in Bath as there are far too many I love to write about them all here.)

When people visit Bath they often ask me what to do. My answer: walk around. Grab yourself a coffee at Colonna & Small's and take the slow route. Soak it up. Drink it in. The architecture is bountiful and beautiful. It’s a city of sweeping crescents, hewn out of Bath Stone. From the Royal Crescent to the hodgepodge posterior of the Pultney Bridge, the architecture is a feat of Georgian excellence and one of the best examples in the country.

Bath is best experienced in the autumn. The crowds have gone and there is a lull before the festivities of the Christmas season. The sun seems lower in the sky somehow and the golden, honeyed stones gleams all the brighter.

Whichever way you turn, nature beckons. Slip down onto the leafy canal via Sydney Gardens (the oldest pleasure garden in the city) and stroll out of the centre towards Bathampton. Here, you’ll find lots of brightly coloured barges with smoking chimneys and fantastical rooftop gardens. Follow the picturesque path down the canal to the George Inn, said to haunted by the ghost of Viscount John Baptiste Du Barry who was killed in winter 1778 in the last legal duel.

If haunted pubs don’t appeal to you but Palladian bridges do, then Prior Park Landscape Garden is a feast for the senses. Now in the care of the National Trust, it’s an intimate 18th-century garden and is home to one of only four Palladian bridges in the world. As you walk down the grazing pasture to reach the bridge, you can feel Capability Brown and Alexander Pope’s influences. From the garden, you have have majestic views over the city and if you fancy a further stretch, enter the skyline walk through an old kissing-gate.

I always say that the best thing about leaving Bath - even for just a weekend - is the returning. The cobbled streets whisper welcome home. I see new things, every time I look. I love watching the city shift as the year turns and how the buildings hold the changing light. And I can’t wait to share more of place with you, dear friend.

P.S - What do you love about Bath?