Wet Weekend in Bath - Christmas Market

It seems a long time ago, but the last weekend in November, I caught a train to Bath with my little sister and the children…

We hadn’t been sure we were going to be able to make it as there had been really bad flooding earlier in the week. Trains were still not running from Exeter all the way to Bath, but when I checked first thing on the Saturday morning there were now trains running from Taunton (better than the previous Bristol!) so we got a lift to Taunton and caught the train from there – I could not face the thought of a coach journey with travel sick Toby, but car then train was doable!

We were so relieved when we arrived in Bath, despite that fact that it was raining, and went straight for lunch. We went to a place that my Dad had been wanting to try out for a while – an exclusively vegetarian pub called The Porter.

As well as the above, there were also some jacket potatoes and interesting sandwiches – my Dad had a toastie with guacamole, salsa and cheddar for example, and they had my favourite Brie and caramelised onion too!

I had a latte as soon as we arrived – with all the rushing around to sort a lift, catch the train etc I hadn’t had a coffee all morning!

I loved going somewhere with so many vegetarian options on the menu – I was spoilt for choice! I would feel hypocritical here not to mention that since Liam moved out, I have eaten meat/fish a few times. However I’m not entirely sure if this is something I will continue, and I am only eating organic meat that I order alongside my veg box, so I’m definitely still sticking to vegetarian food when I'm not the one doing the cooking.

In the end I went for the homemade spicy lentil burger…

which was really tasty, but I wish I'd also ordered the side of fries! I also had a few of my sister’s nachos (she asked for them without salsa/guac, my favourite parts!!!!!)…

and some of Izzy’s lentil lasagne…

All really good! Even Toby’s baked beans on toast (boring!) was humongous!!

After lunch we took our bags back to my Dad’s house and left Toby and my Dad there for a nap. Olivia, Izzy and I then walked into town to do a bit of shopping! Izzy lost her tooth a couple of days before we went to Bath, and she’d decided that she wanted to spend her tooth fairy money in the Disney store!

Of course, everything was way out of her price range, but in the end we found something that wasn’t too expensive and that I didn’t mind topping up the money to buy…!

She loves writing in notebooks so this has already had lots of use!!

After the Disney store we went to look around the Christmas Markets. I didn’t take many photos as it was pouring with rain at this point, but most of the stalls were the same as last year so feel free to look at those posts if you’re interested.

and as well as the above snow globes (only 2 mind, not the whole stall!!) we managed to buy our traditional Christmas tree decorations – from the same stall as we bought them last year!

Once we’d had enough of the rain, Olivia went off to do some clothes shopping (!) and Izzy and I headed to Starbucks. She’d wanted some girly time with just me, and I was happy to oblige!
Chai latte and a divine salted caramel pecan cheesecake for me…

and a marshmallow twizzler for Izzy…

plus a cup of water. Who’d have thought you’d get so much hyperness happiness from a glass of water??!

For those of you who are lucky don’t have young children, the gold thing in the cup is a “Moshi Monster”. Much to my despair, Izzy has recently got into these things, so I bought her a pack of them as a treat for the journey, and she was ecstatic that the surprise one was a gold Moshi – I hadn’t even realised such things existed!!

By the time we walked back to Dad’s it was dark, which was pretty, albeit still very wet!

We got back to Dad’s about 4.30pm so, bearing in mind Toby normally wakes from his nap at 3pm, we walked in noisily without thinking about it. The house was in darkness and Dad quickly “shushed” us, as he wanted me to have the “pleasure” of waking Tobes…the boy loves his sleep!!

We didn’t fancy going back out in the rain for dinner, so Olivia got to have her favourite food ever – Wagamama takeaway!

I had my usual Yasai Yaki Soba plus some vegetable gyoza, fried instead of steamed…

This was ok, but I’m not quite sure why Livs loves having it as takeaway so much – I definitely prefer eating in when it’s delivered fresh to your table!

Toby had fun with the noodles though!

And once the children were in bed, and we were sat on the sofa eating After Eights, Olivia deigned to let me take one photo of her!

I didn’t get a huge amount of sleep as a certain little boy decided he wanted to sleep in my bed…

The bed was so high that I spent the whole night only half asleep to stop him falling out! Let’s just say I was glad when morning came…!!

The next morning I had exciting plans to meet up with an old school friend who I hadn’t seen since Izzy’s christening 4 years ago! I forgot to take any photos but we went to Starbucks for a good catch up and more chai lattes

I then met up with the family again and we went for early lunch at The Cosy Club before our train home. I was gutted as the Sunday was actually a gorgeous day – clear blue skies and no rain, but we had to get an earlier train back to Devon than planned as there was lots of flooding near us due to more rain on the Saturday night, so Mum was worried about being able to get us home from the station. The visit was definitely short but sweet!

I cheered myself up with a divine raspberry mojito (it was 12 o’clock…just!!)…

and for my food I had an English muffin with poached eggs, hollandaise sauce and cooked mushrooms…

Really tasty, but I could’ve happily eaten it twice over!

Izzy wanted me to show you a photo of her lunch too – for the first time ever she found a macaroni cheese that she loved more than mine!!

We had to rush to the train station after this as there was some uncertainty again about whether the trains would be running. I did manage to pick up some cannoli to eat on the train though!

And I also took this photo for Maria/anyone else going to Bath any time soon, gutted we only spotted this on the way to the station (although I suppose it isn’t really the weather for Fro Yo anyway!!)

The train home actually went pretty well. There were delays getting from Bath to Bristol, but the journey from Bristol to Taunton was quick and the flooding had eased a bit on the roads by the time we got back to Devon, luckily. I was shocked by some of the views out of the train window though!

Possibly not the most sensible decision to travel under such weather conditions, but I am still glad we went. It was the only weekend I could get up there, and after everything that had been going on, I really needed to keep to my plans and have a weekend away from everything. Just glad that it worked out ok to get us there and back again safely!

Thanks so much for all my comments on my other post too, I really do appreciate all of them, nice to know there are some people out there thinking of me! 3.5 weeks on from the split, things are beginning to settle down. I just need to get a message through to Toby that I need more sleep – I thought 4.45am wake up yesterday morning was bad, but last night/this morning I had Toby in my bed from midnight, Izzy joined us at 2am (luckily bed is king size!!) and then Toby woke all 3 of us up at 5.15am...yawn!!!

One final photo… due to the weather, we didn’t actually buy much in Bath this year. The tree decorations above, two snow globes, and a few foodie bits…fudge and caramelised nuts:

I had the orange & cranberry fudge a couple of nights ago and I was a little disappointed – the fudge is really good quality but the orange was too tangy for my liking – it took away from the sweetness! The sea salted caramel fudge was Izzy’s choice, but I may have to steal some when she opens it – we sampled that one at the stall and it really is divine!! I’m looking forward to having the winter spiced drinking fudge too, apparently you just stir it into a mug of hot milk – a bit like hot chocolate but this sachet feels squidgy – mmm, yes please!!

Have you been to Bath Christmas Market before? Or any other Christmas Markets? I actually went to another Christmas Market - Exeter - last Saturday. This is the first year they’ve had a Christmas Market and it was fab! I took some photos on my phone so I will try to get a post up soon. I also used to love Southampton & Winchester Christmas Markets when I lived up there for university, the perfect way to get in the mood for the festive season!