Walking the planks in Bristol

DOCKLAND REGENERATION, REPURPOSED BOATS AND MUSEUMS SHED A LIGHT ON THIS SOUTH-WEST CITY'S HISTORIC CONNECTIONS TO THE SEA.

- BEN LERWILL

It's 11pm in Bristol Harbour and the boat is rocking. Hometown shanty band The Longest Johns are on stage, belting out renditions of old maritime tunes while a sold-out, alefuelled crowd are singing along with gusto. The night might be a cold one, but inside is a world of festival lighting and fogged-up specs. The harbour waters lap against the hull as songs of distant seas and drunken sailors are roared out in unison.

Few UK music settings are as unique as Thekla, a 1950s German cargo ship reinvented as a floating events venue. It's now moored permanently near the Grade II-listed Prince Street Bridge, its masts bare but its lower decks regularly crammed with gig-goers. This blurring of the lines between past and present is hard to escape in Bristol. Just a few feet away from the ship's gangway is Mud Dock, a bikeshop-cum-brunch-spot in a brick warehouse. On arrival, you're greeted by a large stencil of Isambard Kingdom Brunel - the 19th-century engineer who designed Bristol's iconic Clifton Suspension Bridge - on a fold-up bike.

For the casual visitor, the harbourside is one of the best places to start making sense of Bristol's complex character. It's here, for starters, that you'll find M Shed, a former transit building turned into a museum. It tells the city's story frankly, with no punches pulled when it comes to its links with the slave trade. Almost directly opposite the museum is the spot where, in 2020, the 125-year-old statue of English merchant Edward Colston was unceremoniously dumped into the dock by locals.