START IN ONE of England’s grandest suburbs at the Clifton Observatory, a former windmill that was converted into a camera obscura in 1828.
From here, there are impressive views across the Avon Gorge (300 feet deep at this point) and of Brunel’s Clifton Suspension Bridge that has spanned it since 1864. Taking the path down Sion Hill, you pass a complex of 19th-century buildings that gaze out at the bridge. First comes the old Clifton Rock Railway, a funicular that used to drop tourists down to the Hotwells volcanic springs on the banks of the River Avon. Next is the Avon Gorge Hotel, which opened in 1896 as the Grand Clifton Spa and Hydropathic Institution, using water pumped up from those wells to provide an efficacious Turkish bath for guests.
These buildings
