Itinerary Ideas

Pop-up history: Even though it had been mooted as early as the C16th, the Rivers Thames & Avon were finally linked in 1810 with the completion of this canal. Originally providing commercial transport between London & the south west, as well as coal from the Somerset coalfields to the cities of Bath & Bristol it reached its peak use in 1840 carrying goods to build the Great Western Railway. Ironic really, as the opening of the railway eventually brought the canal’s business to an end, although commercial use continued up to 1920. The canal is used for leisure today and it’ll take most of 2 weeks to navigate all the way from here to London but the scenery of Wiltshire, Hampshire & Berkshire is stunning. I’ve done it up to Pewsey and would do it again in a heartbeat. A canal holiday is like seeing the world you know from inside a bubble… the world is ‘over there somewhere’ and while you can see it, its just like a little bit of background noise while you chug along through the most stunning & peaceful countryside which you’d never get to see from this perspective in any other way.

Pop-up history: If Bladdud existed, he was the son of King Lear, of Shakespeare fame and was schooled in Athens. On his return home, he was exiled when found to have contracted leprosy and worked as a pig herder near here. The legend says the pigs also showed signs of leprosy but bathed in the thermal waters of the mineral springs which seemed to provide curative qualities to their issue! Bladdud did the same, his leprosy was cured, his people took him back and made them their king… and the rest is history. The statue of Bladude here, used to sit atop the fountain outside the Roman Baths in Stall Street (said fountain is now on Bog Island opposite the Abbey Hotel). He was moved here in the 1970s when a pig was carved in the style of the time to stand beside him… both roughly on the site they’d have bathed in the waters all those years ago.

Pop-up history: This was the first park to carry the name of Queen Victoria, although she opened it when she was just an 11-year old Princess in 1830. The Dell, which is the sunken area on the right in Royal Avenue before you see the Royal Crescent, is a former stone quarry which was planted out as part of the parks landscaping project. Just across the road ahead of this, is a large Bath stone urn with an unusual story relating to a large Georgian villa in Batheaston on the east side of the city. In 1778 Batheaston Villa was the home of Lady Miller, where she hosted a fortnightly poetry competition. Entries were dropped into an antique Italian vase and picked out at random to be read by a gentleman, judged by a committee, and the best was awarded a prize. This quirky gathering became well-known as it was patronised by famous names of the time, including the Duchess of Northumberland who submitted an entry written on the back of a buttered English muffin! The vase became just as famous and this giant stone urn is a copy of the original.

Pop-up history: The large patch of grass on the other side of the mini roundabout is the site of St Andrew’s Church, one of 2 churches which were completely destroyed in air raids over the city known as the Baedeker Raids. The raids had been named after the tourist guidebook series used by Luftwaffe Generals to plot their targets. The church was the work of the great Victorian architect Sir George Gilbert Scott but locals had objected to its spire spoiling the view over the Royal Crescent as it appeared over the roofs when viewed from the front. It’s destruction on the night of Saturday 25^thApril 1942, was subsequently referred to as ‘happily bombed’! The other city church completely destroyed in the same air raids was St James, Stall Street, which stood roughly where Marks & Spencer stands today in the city centre.

Pop-up history: This is the most recently designated park in our walk today, but it’s still over 100 years old having been laid out by the city council in the late 1880s. Like most of the other parks in the city, it was originally intended as a ‘pleasure-ground’… rather like a precursor to todays theme-parks but more refined! Pleasure grounds had all sorts of attractions and there are still traces of them in Hedgemead, such as the bandstand, and contoured walks and terraces, but this is all here at a cost. Above the park sits Camden Crescent which is an C18th development. It was never completed due to a series of landslips in this area, but houses were still developed on the slopes beneath it. In the 1860s a series of further landslips occurred which culminated with a massive slip in 1881 when 135 houses were destroyed. The plans for the park included a cliff railway from the front of the park all the way up to the residential area of Camden… but it was never built because its route passed through a field which had been offered for sale by someone who didn’t even own it!

Pop-up history: This little garden is dedicated to the memory of King George V, grandfather to our present Queen. On his death, the Queen’s uncle became the new King (Edward VIII) but was never crowned as he abdicated the following year, placing the Queen’s father as our new King George VI, and the then Princess Elizabeth as heir to the throne. The area covered by the park had been planned to be part of a residential development started in the 1780s, which was never completed due to a recession across Europe in the 1790s largely sparked by the French revolution of 1789. The only part of the estate to be completed was Great Pulteney Street which we’ll see next, and the last owner of the estate, gifted these 7 acres to the city council who made it into the public park we have today, opened as part of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations of Queen Victoria in 1897.

Pop-up history: On the 11^th December 1799, at number 29 Great Pulteney Street, 3 men met over dinner and discussed the production of the first large scale geological survey in the world. The resulting map was produced (‘written’) by William Smith who remains known around the world as the ‘Father of Geology’. What happened in this room on that night changed the course of human understanding of the physical world, at a time when many still believed that the ground beneath our feet was last altered during the Great Flood when Noah was on his Ark. Sadly, the resulting map by Smith was plagiarised and he ended up in such debt that he sold his collection of rocks to the British Museum and it is now stored in the archive of the Natural History Museum in Kensington. Smith ended up in debtors prison until the Royal Geological Society eventually realised what had happened, paid his way out of prison and gave him a pension to live the rest of his life in Scarborough where a museum to his memory remains to this day, displaying his later life collection of rocks and minerals.

Pop-up history: The concept of Pleasure Grounds took off in 1785 with the Vauxhall Gardens in London. Entry was mostly by annual subscription and there were various attractions and entertainments such as carriage rides, mazes, balloon ascents, and concerts. As Bath was the place to ‘see and be seen’ at the time, it was essential we had a venue like this. ‘Sydney Gardens Vauxhall’ was built as part of the grand plan for the Pulteney Estate and opened in 1795 with: a hedge maze (you can still find maps for this online!); a hermitage; ‘Merlin’ swings (possibly similar to old-fashioned swing boats); a fake castle where mock battles were re-enacted… and much more!

Novellist, Jane Austen lived across the road at 4 Sydney Place for a few years from 1801 and seems to have spent much time in the gardens. However, she doesn’t seem to have been so enamoured by the regular, large gatherings here such as the concerts & public breakfasts. She was intrigued by fireworks though, as Jane writes that she came to one of the concerts, arriving only as it ended just so she could watch the fireworks, but it started raining so they never happened until the concert was restaged at a later time… bad luck Jane!