Old friends in Bath

We picked up daughter and went to Bath to meet friends we haven't seen for more than ten years, lovely people that I've known for more than thirty years, who gave us our visitors' book.

We had a lovely time, including a meal by the river.

Bath and Bristol

We visited the Bath spa on Friday night, meaning to buy a twilight session, but they were all booked up. So we had a shorter session and more expensive package and it was still good - especially the steam rooms with different aromas and heats and foot baths.

We ate Sally Lunn Bath buns for tea, which are something amazing - huge as a tea plate, but light as a fairy cake, and delicious with cinnamon butter - I'm glad we found that café.

We made a quick wander round the Roman Baths yesterday morning before visiting daughter. So I need to come back because there wasn't time to see everything.

Daughter's fine physically, intellectually, academically and socially - I think. She grumbled mildly about hall food and ate a splendid meal with us in a fish restaurant. We talked lots, and then husband drove us into the city where we explored shops like the new precinct, and bought a piece of jewellery that she'd seen. Husband showed us some of his old haunts so daughter knows even more shops to explore in the years that she is there.

Long weekend

Off to Bath for a long weekend and a day trip to Bristol to see daughter

Visiting Bath

Daughter and I went to visit Bath University where she had an interview in the maths department. There was the usual milling around of enthusiastic youngsters, the pleasant experience of finding someone else who is as interested in maths as you are, and the almost-always-male lecturer who provides an explanation of the course and eulogises on the department and the university.

Unfortunately, they did seem to emphasise Bath's great sporting facilities, and there were a lot of very sporty looking people bouncing around with their kit - probably because it's Wednesday afternoon when many universities take the time off studying for sport. This didn't go down too well with daughter, even though they apparently have a good tae kwondo club too.

Two other things put her off:

• the university doesn't have arts or social science faculties and she would like to meet other than scientists, mathematicians and technologists.
  
• after first year you have to live on the other side of the city and it takes 40-50 minutes to get across to the university
  

She quite liked the city; we spent a happy hour exploring the shops in the centre, including a magic shop where we found a birthday present for small cousin, and a chocolate shop...

We got back to the station in time to catch a train just after 5 o'clock.