After our late night at the show morning came early for us as we had booked a tour to see Bath, Stonehenge and Windsor Castle. We got to the area where the busses were meeting near Victoria station and thought we were super early. However they put us on an already mostly full bus and almost immediately left almost 40 minutes before scheduled. Turns out to spread things out they just leave as soon as any bus is full and go from there so we got on the early bird bus. This meant that unlike some of the others we would go to Bath first, then Stonehenge and finally Windsor Castle which is apparently the best for not having as many queues. This also got the longest driving stretch out of the way first thing as we will be working back closer to London with each stop from now on. Bath is a city know for, wait for it, it’s baths! Long known for healing and mineral springs when the Romans came they immediately setup bath houses and a temple on the site. These have been preserves pretty remarkably and this is what we are here to see today. Bath the city would take at least a full day if not a weekend to fully explore. We arrived and got our instructions on meeting back up with the bus and the tour guide got us our tickets and we headed in to the Roman Baths. Like many popular exhibits they probably need to limit more on the number of visitors at any given time but we kept moving through. This one was relatively linear in how they moved you through but a couple of backtracks caused all kinds of traffic jams. This was a cool exhibit seeing such extensive roman ruins especially so far outside of Rome. The lingering sulfur smell and feeling the heat from a couple of the open areas of water was interesting. At the end you get to taste some of the water but honestly like Becky said it was kind of just like the warm water that has set in a metal water bottle all day. We got don’t about 20 minutes before needing to meet the bus so we looked for a convenience store to grab lunch. After grabbing a couple of sandwiches and snacks and then stopped in when we saw our tour guide in a mead shop he had mentioned and we got a sample of mead. We are now riding the bus towards Stonehenge. We heard a bit of the history and story of Stonehenge and the area on the way in then when we got there you are dropped off in a bus parking area and you catch a shuttle over to the actual stones. Once there it is a cool sight to see such a famous landmark but after a bit it is just a group of big stones with a crowd milling around. We spent probably 20 minutes making a full circuit of the stones and taking pictures etc. Then headed back to the Visitors center for a little more context on the site and it’s history and construction. As we left the visitor center to find some restrooms we saw a tent behind the visitors center and it was a Lego build event where kids (or adults) could build little 8×8 stones that then someone else was using to build up a big model of Stonehenge.

Now back on the bus and on the road to Windsor Castle. We did lose a person from the tour who didn’t make it back to the bus on time. This might be the new highlight of my UK trip! Be on time people! At Windsor Castle one reason we left the person at the last became obvious as we were even still a little late and had to move to see the main sights there. We started with St George’s Chapel. This is the venue where Harry and Megan got married and most recently is the final resting place of Queen Elizabeth II. The chapel is beautiful Gothic architecture and a wonderful arched ceiling set with painted coats of arms. We saw the burial places of several kings and also saw the new stone set for Elizabeth. After the chapel we heard straight over to the state apartments and they were hurrying people in there and in another like to the Queens dollhouse exhibit. We got in the state apartment line and figured we would miss the dollhouse. The state apartments were very lavish and the weapons displays on the walls were both artistic and impressive. Tons of paintings and artifacts through the ten or so rooms. We ended up moving through reasonably quickly and at the end a guard was urging people to the exit at the crossroad where you could also get to the dollhouse so i asked if we could quickly jump across and see that before it closes and he checked and let us through so we got to see both! The dollhouse is such an intricate miniature it’s always fun to get a look as you see new and interesting things each time. Once we finished there we headed back towards the bus and found restrooms and some ice cream before boarding and heading back into town for the end of our tour. On our way back to the hotel we stopped at a Doner/burger place we had passed near our hotel several times to try it out. It was a solid choice.. nice and a little spicy for my still upset sinuses and a very filling meal after a long tour day. We then headed to the hotel to pack up and get ready to say goodbye for now to the UK tomorrow morning.