Bath Spa

There's something about the prospect of leaving a country that means I want to encapsulate my thoughts on 'what's it like?'

This end of the trip is and seems like a slower pace, as it was arranged after we had panicked about how fast we would be travelling and how tired and 'over it' we would be. we left ourselves unbooked so we could scurry wearily home....

Nope. Not happening.

Home is known territory. at any time i can picture the sorts of things I would be doing and saying, and I can do that again later. I've got a world to see.

I had a concern that the UK would be too much like home, and that I'd dislike it as being frustratingly familiar but jarringly wrong. When we first arrived, it was a totally welcome thing to be able to easily converse, and float through every day tourist life. And those things are very nice. But since we are mostly avoiding guided tours and chatty encounters, we are not feeling as though we will miss them elsewhere.

I just asked Bob his opinion, and he mentioned that there is one universal throughout the entire UK trip which as been fascinating to him is the absolute contempt everyone here as for their nanny-state health and safety regulations. every tour, every visit seems to have a required blurb which the person has to read out. These are apologised for in advance, read out in a way which is a quick and humorous as possible, and then forgotten as much as possible.

Bob also mentioned that the UK has more different accents than different cultures. We felt that the depths (Conwy and Largs) of Scotland and Wales had cultural differences, but overall, the UK is very homogeneous. Paris had more differences per suburb!

We have been welcomed everywhere. There are more English travellers in our Band B's than anyone else, but throughout Germany a huge proportion of travellers were German, and outside world class tourist attractions, I expect that to continue everywhere. The other huge tourist population here are the Aussies. Our exchange rate is great, and the Aussies are off to see the world!

The essential words you need to know here are 'Hello' and 'Cheers.' In France "pardon' and 'merci' were essential. The Germans needed 'bitte,' 'danke' and 'chow,' but the Brits just aren't as sorry or as thankful as the rest of them! That's a bit harsh - every bus driver gets lots of thanks, and every tour guide gets a clap, but individual chance meetings are no-where near as polite. People passed on a country path are just as likely not to want their presence acknowledged as to say hello, which is more like Australia than Europe.

So overall, an easy place to be in, a fabulous place to have seen, but next time I come here, I'm ordering in a summer to keep me warm.
Yesterday a lady kindly told me she had noticed that the autumn chill had already arrived. When did it leave?

Italy is nearly arranged. We had troubles finding accommodation in Venice, and were reluctantly considering that it was going to be too expensive, when Bob found us some Royal apartments (http://www.royalapartmentsinvenice.com/) at 75 Euro's per day. There were a few extra costs, and we had to arrange a bank transfer of funds to pay the deposit, but Wow!

We were going to go to Tunisia after Italy, but somehow the cruise ship ended up the winner (70% discount on a standard fare). So we are going on a cruise when we are not sure we like them, to a the USA which was low on or priorities to visit... we've done a quick search for accommodation in Miami, and the usual thing we do is look for a place within a mile of the city centre. Miami has NO hotels that close to the 'city.' We haven't checked, but maybe they have buses? They do have hurricanes. I wonder if I'll meet one?

Time to get moving and investigate the wonders of Bath. I am not going swimming - there are no bathers in my luggage.