Train Bumps

Ever since I’d first seen pictures of Bath, UK, I was drawn to it. I can’t explain why exactly, it was just a feeling of ‘I want to go there’.

For those of you who haven’t read any of my other posts/stories I’ll preface this one by sharing that I was living and working remotely from London for about 3 months from March - May 2023. During my time there, I would frequently take trips to other cities. Prior to arriving in London, I knew I wanted to explore more of the UK, but as my time there was drawing to a close I began to realize that most of my travels had taken me to the European mainland. So, when a free weekend came around, I decided it was time to finally visit Bath.

I don’t know if it’s excitement and adrenaline for pending trips or if I’m just an idiot, but too regularly I find myself out drinking the night before a trip and quite hungover for my day of travel. My journey to Bath began no differently. I woke up, packed, took a shower and set out for Bath.

In addition to my hangover, I’d done zero planning for this trip. I went with the intention of it being a day trip but if I ended up having a lot of fun, I’d find a hostel or hotel and stay the night.

I arrived at the train station (I think Paddington? I don’t know. I was hungover and I’m not a real travel blogger). I purchased my ticket, bought some train beers, sat down and cracked a cider to help with the hangover while I waited for my train.

Train station beer while waiting for my train to arrive.

I love trains. Mainly because they’re so casual compared to flying. That said, sometimes they’re SO casual that it almost stresses me out more. For example, there’s no boarding call. There’s not REALLY assigned seats. There’s no security. Sometimes they don’t post the track number until minutes before the train rolls in (I’ve never really understood that one. It’s on a track. How do they not know where it’s going?). And they leave EXACTLY at the noted time of departure. This is a long winded way of me saying, on this particular occasion, I missed my train.

Convinced this wasn’t my fault, I muttered my way to the pub in the station to kill the awkward amount of time until the next departure. To make matters worse, now my ‘train beers’ would be getting warm in my backpack during the wait time. Oh no!

Train station pub beer after missing my train.

Eventually, my train arrived and the exciting part of my journey was underway. Shortly after one of the first couple of stops, a conductor came down the aisle wearing his silly train uniform to check for tickets.

This is another thing about trains I’ve never understood. The tickets aren’t checked right when you get on. Anyway, at this particular stop a group of 3 young guys boarded the train clearly ready for some fun. They were adorned in the typical UK male fashion of the times. A sweater/hoodie/parka, track suit pants, some type of white shoes (dirty), a pirate’s plunder worth of rings, and a fanny pack strung across their chests.

I’m not exaggerating when I say that as soon as the conductor had checked their tickets and passed their seats to continue his patrol one of the guys pulled out a small plastic baggie filled with white powder. The key came out and he ravaged the bag with the eagerness of a child with a fresh fun-dip. Except with his nose. I couldn’t help but giggle. There was no trip to the bathroom for it. No trying to get his friends to create a barrier of some kind. No attempt to duck down low between the seats. And the conductor was still in the same car! I’ve never seen such casual, public cocaine usage in my life.

Shortly after his hit, he made eyes at me with the friendly, “you want to get in on this”. I did the subtle ‘no thanks’ hand wave and accompanied head shake, but not wanting to look like a stiff decided to save face by opening up the conversation. I learned that they were on their way to a music festival in Bristol, just a couple of stops further than Bath at the end of the line. This was shaping up to be a potential abrupt change of plans, but I needed to qualify things further. I learned that it was a heavy EDM festival, and the decision was made. I would carry on to Bath and pass on the festival.

I would later learn that Arctic Monkeys, one of my favorite bands in the world, were playing a show that weekend. While they weren’t playing at the specific festival that the train party bros had mentioned, part of me wishes I’d at least done more fact checking and research on the festival to see if it would have been worthwhile. A learning experience.

As the train ride continued, I heard two ladies in conversation a couple of seats behind me and across the aisle. I wasn’t positioned correctly to get a good look or hear them clearly, but the wheels were already in motion. “This is it”, I thought. “This is how I meet my hot European girlfriend leading to marriage and dual citizenship”. I started up a conversation with them and quickly learned my wishes would not be coming true. They were sisters from the United States, and one of them happened to be from Alexandria, VA, which was pretty wild considering I’d just spent about 8 years living in Washington, DC.

They shared that they were also on their way to Bath, and aside from visiting the Roman Baths and getting some weird drink from a Wetherspoons, they had no definitive plans. The Wetherspoon visit on their to-do list was quite funny to me because Wetherspoons are basically working-class pubs known for having the cheapest pints, affordable meals, and the tackiest carpet. They’re also all over the place, so it’s hardly a unique experience, aside from the carpet (no two Wetherspoons has the same carpet pattern).

They were, seemingly, unaware of this and I didn’t want to spoil anything for them, so I kept my laughs to myself. Our to-do lists were similarly sparse, and the few items that we did have noted were congruent, so we decided to team up and see Bath together.

After some research, we learned that the ’spoons they were looking for was close to the train station, so we would check that off the list before carrying on. The bartender had no clue what the drink was that the sisters were trying to order, but we made do.

We polished off our pints and then continued our exploration of Bath. Sadly, we learned that the Roman Baths, one of the main tourist attractions of the city was booked solid both that evening and the following day, so that attraction would have to wait for another trip. We were able to view the exterior of the Roman Baths and dine along the River Avon.

After our meal, we continued our exploration, which had effectively turned into a pub crawl since learning of the Roman Baths being booked solid for the duration of our day.

Eventually, we found ourselves at a very cool, seemingly very old pub and inn called The Star Inn, which, according to their site, was a recipient of the CAMRA Pub of Year Award in 2022 and is,

“a classic example of an untouched multi-roomed English public house, where beer is still served from the jug.  First licensed in 1760, The Star Inn retains many of its original features including 18th century bar fittings and wooden benches. Described by CAMRA (The Campaign for Real Ale) as a ‘rare and unspoiled pub interior of outstanding historic interest’, the Star Inn is listed on the National Inventory of Heritage Pubs.”

In said pub, we began chumming it up with the locals, a skill we had pretty much mastered by this point of our adventure. We met a Canadian man named Rick, who is probably part of the reason why ‘Canadians are the friendliest people in the world stereotype’ exists. He’s also the reason that I now know that Black Sambuca exists. He was pretty adamant about us trying some, so we did.

Later that evening, Rick also became determined to do tequila shots with us. And we did. Rick would proceed to get thrown out of the pub several half-hours later. My memory is hazy as to why exactly, but I think he may have ‘tackled’ a woman. I put, ‘tackled’, in quotes because this guy was so friendly that it’s hard to imagine him doing anything intentionally sinister. It’s more likely that he was just proper bent and accidentally stumbled into her. That Black Sambuca/Tequila combo will really get ya!

Now, you’ll recall from earlier that in my preparation for Bath, or rather lack thereof, I was going to stay the night if I deemed it worthwhile. I was having a blast and elected to do just that, so I parted ways with my newly made American friends and began looking for hotel or hostel to sleep in. (Realistically, there wouldn’t have been any trains running at that hour anyway, so I guess it was lucky I was having a good time).

At this point, it was probably 12:30 AM and after trying 3 to 4 various hostels/hotels, all of which were booked to capacity, I started to get a bit worried. I was already exhausted from my hangover, day of travel and pub crawl, and now it was the dead of the night and I had no place to stay. My phone was on the borderline of dead and my shoulders were aching from lugging around my backpack all day. Needless to say, I was also in no position to go for an all-nighter.

I learned of a Holiday Inn Express (this is not sponsored content…yet) on the outskirts of town and so I ordered an Uber and prayed to God my phone wouldn’t die. I arrived at the hotel and asked for a room. The concierge told me there were no rooms available. A blend of panic and sadness came over me. Trying my best to stay cool, I asked if she knew of anywhere else I could look. She eyed me with pity, shook her head and explained it was a busy weekend and that everything was pretty much all booked up.

I gulped, prepared to pivot and walk myself out the automated sliding doors, while telling myself, “strap in. This is going to be one hell of a night and things may get a little weird. Probably more Black Sambuca too”.

Then, all of a sudden, my little concierge angel said that she could probably make one room work but I HAD to be out before 11:00 AM. She ran the price by me, but at that point I didn’t care. I would have paid just about anything. (It is crazy to me though that a Holiday Inn in Bath is like 3 times the price of a 3 bed-room apartment in the heart of Seville. Just saying).

As I walked to my room, my gratitude for my little concierge angel began to morph into frustration and anger. If she had a room available, I wondered, “why didn’t she just tell me that from the beginning? Was it a test to see how desperate I really was and up-charge the heck out of my room? Did she just hate Americans? But everyone kept mistaking me as Canadian”.

I still will never know, but the following morning I had a hunch as to why she may have been hesitant to offer me a room.

The next morning I awoke more tired than hungover. I showered, cleaned up the room and prepared to leave well ahead of my strict 11:00 AM checkout time. As I began to put on my super cool, sleek, black, suave, European style, Chelsea zip-up boots I got a whiff of a foul odor. I checked my right shoe. Clean. I checked my left shoe. Covered in shit. I made my way to the sink and began to run my boots under the sink while scraping and polishing the stinky poop away with Holiday Inn Express-ply toilet paper (believe me now when I say this is not sponsored content?).

Eventually, I had them looking brand new and was on my way with my head held high despite the embarrassment coursing through my veins.

This, I began to think, was probably the reason I was nearly refused a room the night before; A travel-worn, American reeking of Black Sambuca with a left boot, while stylish, covered in the foulest of Bath dookie.

As I set out eager to explore more of the city, I couldn’t help but smile at the irony of having stepped in poop in one of the most beautiful cities in the world that also happened to be called “Bath”.

Part of the reason I had elected to stay the night was that I had learned of some other sites to check out from the locals I’d spoken with the night before. After stopping for coffee, I made my way towards the Royal Crescent, which has been featured in loads of British period pieces like Jane Austin’s, ‘Persuasion’, ‘The Duchess’, and ‘Bridgerton’.

Bath is just an unbelievably beautiful city. The buildings are made of an earthy colored, smooth stone that gives it an air of elegance and sturdiness. It’s kind of like when you see some excellent granite kitchen counter tops, or furniture crafted from the finest oak. The longevity, style and ware of it is an indicator of the attention given in its construction.

At the same time, there is so much green. I feel so stupid writing this, but there are some absolutely gorgeous trees in Bath. And I think without them, the labyrinth of vault-like stone buildings coupled with the typical English Weather would leave it feeling a rather wet, drafty, cold place. Like some posh prison perpetually battered by cold rain and shrouded in grayness from the ever present clouds overhead.

Instead, you’re left with a fantastical marriage of elegance, from the nobly sculpted buildings, and wildness, from the foliage peppered throughout the city.

I gradually continued my exploration while making my way back towards the train station where I would fumble my way into yet another adventure, but that adventure is for another post. Instead, I’ll leave you with some pictures of my final, tasty meal in Bath.

A silly goose….get it?