© Chris Catling

Bristol sits on the banks of the Avon and its port is associated with explorers, wine merchants and Atlantic liners. Though the port was heavily bombed during World War II, a touch of old Bristol still survives. As you walk from the station into the city centre, you will pass through Queen Square (named after Queen Anne, 1665-1714), where elegant merchants' houses sit above cavernous cellars, dug to store barrels of imported sherry, port, Madeira and wines from Bordeaux.

It was a short step from here to the timber-framed Llandoger Trow pub in King Street, where Daniel Defoe was introduced to a sailor called Alexander Selkirk one day in 1664. Defoe listened entranced to Selkirk's extraordinary story of shipwreck and rescue, and turned his adventures into Robinson Crusoe (1719) one of the best-selling books of all time.

King Street leads to Narrow Quay where a footbridge crosses the boat-filled stretch of water known as St Augustine's Reach, leading to the thoroughly modern shopping mall and restaurant complex that has spring up on the site of the redundant docks.

© Chris Catling The @Bristol science and natural history complex

A short way through this maze of glass and steel you will find a group of harbourside attractions that could easily take up your time for the rest of the day. Collectively known as @Bristol, there are three big attractions here, comprising an IMAX Theatre, an interactive science museum called Explore, and the Wildwalk complex devoted to conservation where you can study the life of a living coral reef or watch butterflies lazily flapping between orchids and lianas in the rainforest.

If you are more interested in industrial and maritime heritage, then ignore the footbridge and continue down Narrow Quay, past the Architecture Centre, which mounts temporary exhibitions on the city's modern and historic buildings and has a comprehensive stock of books about Bristol's history. The Arnolfini Gallery alongside is currently undergoing a refurbishment: once finished it will continue to be the premier venue in the west of England for contemporary drama, dance, music and art - as well as having one of the best coffee bar in town!

Crossing the swing bridge beyond the gallery, turn right along the long quay that leads to the city's Industrial Museum. The smells of coal and oil still linger around the giant sheds that house displays of all the many products that were once manufactured in Bristol - and it is an extraordinary range, from tobacco and chocolate, to the world's first touring caravan, the Wanderer, to aircraft such as the pre-war Brabazon and the supersonic Concorde.

Continue along the docks a little further and you will find the Maritime Heritage Centre where the star attraction is Isambard Kingdom Brunel's ship, the SS Great Britain. When it was launched in 1843, the steam powered vessel was twice as big as any previous ship and it featured revolutionary design features such as a wrought-iron hull and screw propellers. Despite beginning life as a luxury trans-Atlantic liner, the SS Great Britain was later used as a troopship during the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny and then it carried emigrants to America and Australia.

Superseded by faster ships, she was deliberately wrecked off Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands until a mammoth salvage effort was launched in 1970, and the hull was towed back to Bristol, where the ship is slowly being restored. Christmas 2003 saw the unveiling of the first part of the ship to be refurbished - the glittering stern, with its gilt ornamental decoration and elegant dining saloon gives you a sense of the luxury that first-class passengers enjoyed on trans-Atlantic crossings.

Though not quite so splendid, the little ferry boats that shuttle round the harbour are definitely worth trying for a different view of the docks, or for a longer trip to view the Avon Gorge with another of Brunel's engineering masterpieces, the Clifton Bridge. There is a landing stage alongside the SS Great Britain, and a round trip of 40 to 60 minutes will take you past corn, tea and tobacco warehouses, bridges, cranes and tugs, sea-going vessels and inland craft and the wildlife that lives in the harbour - cormorants, geese, swans, herons and ducks - and perhaps even the flash of a blue kingfisher.