Volume Twelve - Pre-Victorian to the Present Day - further aspects - The Bristol Channel District Guide - selected articles - [1934 Edition] . . . .

Having reached the Hotwells, and settled down on board the steamer, we find ourselves afloat on the waters of the River Avon,* which has a course of about eighty miles, rising near Tetbury, passing through Gloucestershire, Wiltshire, and flowing into the Bristol Channel at Kingroad (Portishead).

* The local prefix is necessary, for there are no fewer than seven or eight other rivers of this name in the kingdom, which is accounted for by the fact that Avon was the ancient British word for river or stream.

Looking down the river on the left we have the wooded slopes of Leigh, behind which lies Ashton Court, a fine country seat, which was used as a hospital during the War. On the right are the towering rocks of St. Vincent.

High overhead is the fairy-like Suspension Bridge, connecting Clifton with Leigh Woods, and linking up the counties of Gloucestershire and Somerset. And behind us is the shipping in the Docks and the course of the river known as the New Cut, made in connection with the present Floating Harbour in 1804-1809.

Old geologists assigned the origin of the Avon Gorge to an earthquake, and tradition used to have it that this stupendous upheaval occurred on the day of the Crucifixion ;  but the modern theory is that the river was once a swift-running stream draining an area at a far higher level than its present basin, and that it " worked " its channel long ages ago, gradually wearing down the rocks until formed its present bed to flow uninterruptedly into the Bristol Channel.

Like many other rivers, the Avon has its legend. Vincent and Goran, twin giants, with a pickaxe, it is said, hewed the deep chasm through which the imprisoned river could run to meet the sea. Each chose a different spot for his work, several miles apart; and as they had only one pickaxe between them, they worked and rested by hourly turns, throwing the pick from one to the other.

One foggy day, as Goran was resting, Vincent threw the pick as usual, but unfortunately struck his brother on the head and  killed him. Vincent then completed the work alone, and was one day gazing upon the gorge he had formed when he fell head foremost into the river. The floods carried away his body to the mouth of the Avon, where to this day it lies buried at a place which " Bristowe's Mariners call the ' Swash. '"