To ask for your experiences with Bath/strange atmospheres

I love Bath and have very happy memories of spending school holidays there visiting my glorious grandparents. I try and visit with own kids at least once a year. We're going tomorrow infact

Yes! Lived there four years, a string of constant bad luck whilst there, I was so depressed and anxious I couldn't leave the house! Moved somewhere different (so wasn't homesickness) and I was fine in months.

This is really interesting, I loved both Bath and Glastonbury when I visited, but I felt incredibly peaceful in Wells when we visited, I don't really believe in all the woo stuff but I felt like it was my spiritual home!

Glastonbury disliker here. So excited to go. Couldn't wait to leave. At first just felt a strong feeling of anticipation. Something going to happen. Turned into oppressive menace.
This sums up my visit to Glastonbury perfectly. I love woo so was really excited but left feeling quite scared

Tavistock gave me the willies.
Brighton wasn't great either. Forced fun but a huge undercurrent of miserable drug use.

I have never been to Glastonbury, but like most of the places mentioned here (including Bath).

I wonder if the radon map has something to do with it? I live, and grew up in a high radon area so perhaps I am not sensitive to it as some people are?

It is just big cities that get me. I hate London and Manchester. I was in a different city as a student and found it ok but when I came home (semi rural location) I felt so much more relaxed seeing fields and open spaces. Nothing woo though.

I lived in Bath for a year and then we gave up and moved about 10 miles away. It's... not very nice. Listed Georgian buildings mean mouldy windows and damp prevails. You go up the back streets north of Milsom Street and there are rows and rows of silent townhouses split into flats that you never see anyone come out of. There are some horrendously ugly metal bridges crossing the river. The nightlife is weird and aggressive - groups of drunks wandering about at night yet very few visible clubs or bars. And, of course, the tourists. You can't move from Easter to the Christmas Markets.

I feel like that about Avebury. I quite like it in the day but still feel uneasy. Cant drive through it at night though.

Never felt weird in Bath. Glastonbury yes, but because of the druggies. Somerton made me feel scared though. Isle of Wight would feel very different if it wasn't an island. I think it's the fact you can't get off it easily that's the problem!

Yes ..to both Bath and Brighton . I have had happy and romantic times in both places and lived in Brighton for a while, but they both also have a sad and menacing edge and I think for me it's due to the Georgian architecture .The tall buildings look wonderful but its the backs that get to me and I just get a sense of unease and sadness, perhaps influenced by Hogarth prints of misery ..but definitely something 'off' about both towns...a lot of these spa and holiday towns have a sadness about them .

I have no problems with Bath. Some of the people through....... (I live between Bristol and Bath)....

The place that made me feel uneasy was the German underground hospital on Jersey.

I'm of the very woo opinion, that we all resonate or conduct various things.

I used to work at a two thousand year old monument. Never felt a thing.
Worked in a Georgian mansion, and had to fight the urge to run screaming

I found Bath very disappointing, although not particularly weird. Ashburton though, I worked there for a while and definitely had the ‘life sucked out of me’ feeling. Nothing would persuade me to set foot in the place again.

We're in holiday on the IOW at the moment and it's very old fashioned but I like that.
Norwich is a very strange place though.

My daughter has just moved back home after living in Bath for 6 years. She had really bad anxiety there and thought moving home would be better but now shes desperately missing Bath and will probably move back. The only time I felt weird about a place was Portland. Just felt so so weird even approaching it from the mainland. Could sense the atmosphere. No offence x

Harrogate does nothing for me. I don’t think it’s quite ‘woo’ but whenever I’ve been I find I just want to leave again. It seems soulless.

I have felt the same in Bristol and Eastbourne

Loved Bath!

Walsingham is an odd place. People all looked the same somehow - same expressions.

I’ve been to Bath a couple of times and did find it a bit strange. I thought I would love it but I didn’t. I didn’t not like it but I have no desire to really go back (although we don’t live near there anymore so wouldn’t be a first choice geographically to visit anyway).

I felt it lacked cohesion - it has so much history it was overwhelming.
It all seemed very separate. We visited the German Christmas shop/cafe, the Roman baths, went to a Jane Austin costume exhibition, then did a pretty boring bus tour that seemed to never end, then had dinner at a very weirdly empty restaurant, then stayed at a manky travel lodge. Really odd experiences. Perhaps the eras all compete with each other to give a confusing feeling of not belonging?

I get a similar feeling when visiting York.

Walsingham in Norfolk, freaked me and my daughter out. It feels oppressive and dead, like something awful happened there. We walked round for a bit, looked at each other and realised we both wanted to leave ASAP. We make an effort to avoid it whenever we are visiting Norfolk now.

Lived ( Walcot) and worked in Bath for a couple of years.
Lovely work colleagues, but could not settle there at all, and I've worked in different cities. Bath just never felt quite right.

York-I always felt fine there.

Harrogate always felt blah to me too, but Bath was a strange vibe.
I used to shiver walking past a couple of little old houses, even in the day time. .

I've seen a few posts on here saying similar about the south west OP. Glastonbury is often mentioned. Some say it's something to do with lay(?) lines?
I felt Bristol had a similar off vibe.

No wonder I get the willies there - I’m convinced the locals are all aliens in human-skin bodies

I work in Buxton and am inclined to agree with you. I live in Macclesfield and have to do the “cat and fiddle” drive over which can be either incredibly bleak and depressing, or beautiful and awe inspiring depending on the weather/my mood.