One day in Bath: a self-guided walking itinerary

The abbey quarter and the hot spring

Start at the Guildhall Market, Bath's oldest shopping site, under its domed roof. The market trades Monday to Saturday and closes on Sundays, so if your day is a Sunday, begin at the Abbey instead. Coffee first, then Bath Abbey: look at the east end, then go in (£9 for adults), and book a Tower Tour if the stairs and the view appeal, though it is not for anyone uneasy with heights or enclosed spaces. Tower tours run Monday to Saturday. Next comes Parade Gardens, free to enter since April 2025 and the calmest bench above the river. Then Sally Lunn's, in the oldest house in the city, for a Bath bun and the kitchen museum in the cellars. Your Roman Baths entry falls at Abbey Churchyard, where the spring, the temple and the Pump Room all sit together. Book a late-morning slot so it lands where the walk does, and remember advance tickets are £2 less than on the day, £26.50 for adults on weekdays. Finish at the Cross Bath, where the water still rises warm behind a Georgian colonnade.

• HoursThe Roman Baths keep a 9am to 6pm day with last admission at 5pm on its autumn schedule, and only Christmas Day and Boxing Day close the site.SourceRoman Baths, visit page
• TicketsAdvance Roman Baths tickets are £2 less than on the day: adults pay £26.50 on weekdays, more at weekends and bank holidays.SourceRoman Baths, tickets and pricing
• TicketsBath Abbey admission is £9 for adults, £7.50 for students and £5 for children aged 5 to 15; guided Tower Tours (£18, £15 or £12) include the abbey floor and the Discovery Museum.SourceBath Abbey, visiting
• AccessThe Roman Baths are mostly step-free, with around 90% of the site wheelchair accessible and four lifts, though some historic steps remain; the abbey tower is not suitable for visitors with poor mobility, claustrophobia or vertigo.SourceRoman Baths, FAQs·Bath Abbey, tower tours

EatCoffee at the Guildhall Market, then a Bath bun at Sally Lunn's, in the oldest house in the city.

Over the river to Bathwick

• 1Pulteney Bridge2 min
• 2Laura Place3 min
• 3Great Pulteney Street5 min
• 4Holburne Museum1 min
• 5Sydney Gardens1 min
• 6Minerva's Temple1 min
• 7Sydney Gardens Footbridges2 min
• 8Cleveland House3 min
• 9Kennet and Avon Canal Towpath

Cross Pulteney Bridge, one of only four bridges in the world with shops across its full span on both sides, and follow the Pulteney estate's sales campaign south: Laura Place and its fountain, then Great Pulteney Street, built to make the new suburb of Bathwick look like a palace front. At the far end is the Holburne Museum, the former Sydney Hotel, and this is lunch: the ground-floor café and shop are free to walk into, the galleries are £16.50, and under 18s go free. The museum opens at 10am, 11am on Sundays and bank holidays, and takes last admissions at 4:30pm. Behind it, Sydney Gardens has been a public pleasure ground since 1795 and never closes. The route passes Minerva's Temple, built for a 1911 exhibition, and the two Coalbrookdale iron footbridges cast for the canal in 1800. Cleveland House, the canal company's old headquarters, stands over the tunnel mouth, and the block ends on the Kennet and Avon towpath at Sydney Wharf, where the narrowboats moor. If it rains, the museum is the dry option; if not, the towpath is the better one.

• HoursThe Holburne opens daily 10am to 5pm, from 11am on Sundays and bank holidays, with last admissions at 4:30pm.SourceHolburne Museum, ticket information
• CostHolburne general admission is £16.50 and free for under 18s; the ground-floor shop and café are free to walk into, and collection displays are free on Wednesdays after 3pm.SourceHolburne Museum, ticket information

EatLunch at the Holburne's ground-floor café; the shop and café are free to walk into.

The Georgian climb to the Crescent

Begin the climb at Queen Square, John Wood the Elder's first set piece, where Jane Austen lodged at number 13 in 1799. Gay Street rises from the square: the Austen family moved to number 25 after her father died, and at number 40 the Jane Austen Centre tells the Bath years with costumed guides, Regency dress to try on and a Regency Tea Room. Adult tickets are £18 online. At the top, the Circus, a ring of houses wearing three orders of columns, then through Brock Street to No. 1 Royal Crescent, the townhouse museum at the eastern end of the curve. It opens Tuesday to Sunday, 10am to 5:30pm with last entry at 4:30pm, costs £16 for adults, free for under 18s, and the ticket works for return visits for a year. Beyond it the Royal Crescent runs its long sweep above Royal Victoria Park. Walk through the Circus and reach No. 1 before its 4:30pm last entry; if you also want the Jane Austen Centre and its tea room, give them another morning rather than squeezing both in. The Assembly Rooms on Bennett Street are closed for renovation until 2027, and the Fashion Museum's old home inside them is closed too, so treat those as an exterior mention from the Circus. End on the Gravel Walk, where Anne Elliot and Captain Wentworth settle everything in Persuasion.

• HoursNo. 1 Royal Crescent opens Tuesday to Sunday, 10am to 5:30pm, with last entry at 4:30pm, and stays closed most Mondays outside school holidays and bank holidays.SourceNo. 1 Royal Crescent, visit
• TicketsAdmission at No. 1 Royal Crescent is £16, £14.50 for concessions and free for under 18s, and tickets can be reused by the named holder for a year.SourceNo. 1 Royal Crescent, visit
• TicketsJane Austen Centre adult tickets are £18 online, with concessions for students and over 60s at £16.30; pre-booking is recommended and last entry is an hour before closing.SourceJane Austen Centre, Bath
• AccessNo. 1 Royal Crescent has a step-free route with a lift to several rooms, alongside the traditional stair route through the house.SourceNo. 1 Royal Crescent, visit

EatTea and cake in the Regency Tea Room at the Jane Austen Centre on Gay Street.

Walcot Street and Camden Crescent

Walcot Street runs north along the line of the Roman road and has been a working street for close to two thousand years. By evening the shops have closed and the street turns to food and drink: Landrace does wood-fired pizza at the Yellow Shop stop, and the Bell Inn, a pub owned by the people who drink in it, keeps music in the back room. Come back on a Saturday for the daytime street: the flea market, the cheesemongers, the vintage rails at the Yellow Shop and the hand-dyed yarn at A Yarn Story. The climb continues past St Swithin's Church, Bath's last 18th-century parish church, whose east end overhangs the pavement, then through Hedgemead Park, planted on the hillside the builders abandoned. Camden Crescent, begun in 1788, stops where the ground slipped, and its raised pavement gives the day its last view back across the city.

• HoursThe Roman Baths add later openings through the summer with their Summer Lates programme, if you want the Great Bath after dinner.SourceRoman Baths

EatWood-fired pizza at Landrace on Walcot Street, or a pint at the Bell Inn.