Bristol has been on my to visit properly list for a long time - I’ve been once before when a company I used to work for did a charity day rebuilding a children’s playground. We were there for 8 hours or so. Not enough time to explore or really get a feel for the place. This time we did.

Boats moored along Bristol's floating harbour, with kayakers paddling past and colourful houses on the hillside beyond

Looking up at the bow of SS Great Britain in dry dock, gold figurehead detail and rigging against a blue sky

We did a lot of walking along the waterfront on a warm and sunny September day.

Tall black dockside cranes with angular, futuristic silhouettes against a blue sky with light cloud

A curved grey dockside crane arm with hook and chains hanging over the harbour

I loved the old dock equipment - cranes and the like. On a sunny day I found them really beautiful to look at, and great to see them in situ, with signs suggesting they still work. I imagine on a dark, grey wintery day they’d look menacing, like something out of a sci-fi film.

We also took Breezy on her first and second ferry journeys. The first across the harbour. The second on the Bristol Ferry between SS Great Britain to Castle Park. She coped well. Perhaps she’ll become a veritable salty sea dog?

The curved concrete facade of a former Lloyd's Bank building, with a colourful mural along its graffitied hoarding

I was taken with the scale of the abandoned Lloyd’s Bank buildings. It seems like a vast unused complex.

A very walkable city on a glorious day.