Albion tourist

Bath's Roman spa

Even during the Georgian heyday of the Bath spa the original Roman baths were buried. The Victorians discovered them trying to fix a drainage problem.

The Roman statues were a Victorian addition. Their idea of what the original baths looked like.

Overflow drain. The red color is from the iron in the spa water.

Bath

This small city, celebrated for its mineral springs, is about 2 hours west of London. We spent a day and a half here.

River Avon

Royal Crescent (from Bath's Georgian heyday).

Garden south of the Crescent.

The Circle.

Gay Street. (south of the Circle).

London

We spent most of our time in London. We stayed in a western suburb (West Drayton) and would take the train into London to see stuff.

Tate Modern.

Hyde park

Iggy Pop flogging car insurance. You could see these ads all over Britain.

In an attempt to repay our hostess Val for her hospitality, I spent a couple of hours cutting down and digging out the roots of a dead tree in her garden. This is my trophy, the main root.

Trafalgar Square is near the government center of Westminster and Whitehall. It's where the big political demonstrations take place. On this Sunday there was a celebration of the Muslim festival of Eid al-Fitr.

I asked why the celebration was today when Eid was two week earlier and was told this was the only good date the organizers could get to use the square.

There was a lot of Islamic pop and hip hop on the stage. It was a bit like Christian rock. (By this time it was raining pretty hard.)

Still more Edinburgh

Cowgate.

Wierd plant.

Sundown at our cheap hotel.

Royal yacht HMY Britannia

This ship was a sort of floating palace for the Queen, launched in 1953 and put out to pasture in 1999.

It was a good way for her to travel to other countries but still being able to invite those countries' heads of state to dine on her own turf.
Unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your politics), HMS Britannia is the end of the line. There will be no more royal yachts.
It was too old to upgrade and the terrorism threat made it too much of a target.

This was one of about three different staff lounges in the Yacht. To avoid fraternization within the hierachy, each level of crew had it's own place to socialize.