Lydney harbour must be one of the great tourist attractions of the Forest. You have to pass through some ugly post-industrial scenery from Lydney station to get there, but it’s worth it.

In its industrial heyday it was a busy industrial port, supplying local coal, iron and tin to the world. A pre-first world war photograph on display at the site shows crowded harbour with ships, tramways, sailors and people involved in the action. It was the gateway to the world for Forest exports, being the site where the canalised River Lyd joins the Severn.

The lock gates transferring vessels from River Lyd/canal level to River Severn level are still there, although I suspect that they are not now often used.

It used to be a passenger port until quite recently. I remember trips to Weston and Ilfracombe on the Balmoral and other tourist venues some years ago. A boat leaving Lydney on a 5 hour tour of the lower Severn and north Devon would be prevented by the tidal system from returning to the harbour, so passengers would be discharged at a south Wales port to be bussed back to Lydney.

And now the harbour is a quiet scenic spacious place for a visit, with the Hips café, a well-stocked, friendly amenity providing connoisseur standard coffee. There are views downstream to the ‘old’ Severn Bridge, beyond the mud flats of Alvington and Aylburton. The earliest local painting I bought on my first visit to the forest in the early 1970s was by distinguished local artist Doug Eaton, which shows the Severn almost empty at low tide in the evening, with mud banks and two fishermen returning from their day’s work. It’s low key, atmospheric, serene and peaceful, and it still hangs on a Forest View wall.

From the harbour there are great views across the Severn from Lydney harbour to the low Cotswold Hills and the high silos at Sharpness at the entrance to the Sharpness to Gloucester Canal, close to where a shipping disaster destroyed the rail bridge from Sharpness to Purton in 1960. And there are short scenic riverside walks. A walk along open fields will take you to Aylburton, and there is a wooded cliff track in the opposite direction which leads to the remote settlement of Gatcombe.

And there’s the River Severn, in its varied moods, angry, peaceful, agitated or empty.