Anniversary splurge

Just last month, I took issue with the travel guru Rick Steves’ questionable claim that “Bath is the mecca for Austen devotees.” (That would be Chawton, in my not-so-humble opinion.) But if by “mecca” you mean “site of the single most expensive Austen 250 tie-in,” he might have a point.

I refer to the Royal Crescent Hotel’s “Jane Austen Experience,” an “exclusive Jane Austen anniversary package” that includes a night in the luxury hotel, spa access, breakfast, afternoon tea, a two-hour tour of Austen’s Bath, and “a Jane Austen novel and custom notelets in your room upon arrival.” Given that this package starts at £660 (about $892), that book better be a hardback.

To be fair, the Royal Crescent is a splurge no matter when you choose to visit, and no wonder: It’s located smack in the middle of Bath’s most spectacular Georgian terrace, a graceful sweep of thirty terraced houses built between 1767 and 1775, the year of Austen’s birth.

Even an off-peak night’s stay in the least palatial of the hotel’s rooms will run you £348 ($470); the suites can go for triple that much, and the price of the eight-person Garden Villa (“magnificent is an understatement”) is only available upon request. Just by itself, the Jane Austen tea (sandwiches, scones, and pastries, one of them decorated with an edible Austen silhouette), will run you £49 ($66) per person—and that’s without champagne.

The hotel is offering its Jane Austen Experience through September 30--that is, until the end of the month that includes Bath's biggest Austen attraction, the all-Regency-costumes-all-the-time Jane Austen Festival.

Will I be treating myself to the Royal Crescent’s anniversary package? Um—no. But if you do, drop me a line on a Jane Austen notelet.