England Guide
The West Midlands and the Peak District
Buxton
BUXTON holds a string of excellent hotels and B&Bs, making it a perfect base for exploring much of the Peaks National Park. It also hosts the outstanding Buxton Festival ( 
01298/70395; 
www.buxtonfestival.co.uk ), featuring classical music and opera and running for two weeks in July as well as the Gilbert & Sullivan Festival ( www.gs-festival.co.uk , 01422/323 252), a three-week affair in August mainly featuring amateur troupes and attracting an enthusiastic audience.
Buxton has a long history as a spa, beginning with the Romans, who happened upon a spring from which 1500 gallons of pure water gushed every hour at a constant 28°C. Impressed by the recuperative qualities of the water, the Romans came here by the chariot load, setting a trend that was to last hundreds of years. The spa's salad days came at the end of the eighteenth century with the fifth Duke of Devonshire's grand design to create a northern answer to Bath or Cheltenham, a plan ultimately thwarted by the climate, but not before some distinguished buildings had been erected, most memorably The Crescent. Neither was Victorian Buxton a laggard, for although it may not have had quite the elan of its more southerly rivals, it still flourished, creating the raft of handsome stone houses that edge the town centre today. The stickiest years came after the town's thermal baths were closed for lack of custom in 1972, but Buxton hung on to emerge as the most appealing town in the Peaks.
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