Glasgow gets a lot of love as a city break, but point yourself west and you'll hit the Firth of Clyde, where the sea forks into long, fjord-like lochs lined with small coastal towns. Helensburgh is one of the best of them — and it's barely 30 miles from the city, about a 50-minute drive or a 40-minute train ride. There's history in its tourist appeal too: the first commercially successful steamship in Europe was ferrying Glaswegians down the Clyde to Helensburgh's Baths Hotel all the way back in 1812. Today trains run straight into a station in the middle of town, and Glasgow Airport is the nearest major hub.

Start at Colquhoun Square, the town's living room. On the second and last Saturday of each month it hosts a market selling crafts, produce and homemade sweets. Around the corner, Capercaillie Gifts & Home is the spot for properly Scottish souvenirs — handwoven wool scarves, countryside-scented candles, and an entire shrine to Highland cows in mug, cookie and cuddly-toy form. On Clyde Street, parallel to the water, Tweedie sells leather and tweed goods like bakerboy hats and handbags.

Being a Scottish waterfront town, Helensburgh does seafood well. The Commodore on West Clyde Street is a local favourite with a 4.6 Google rating across 2,300 reviews — a classic pub with a sea-view patio, cask ales and plates like king prawn skewers, salmon fishcakes and seabass fillets. Back at the square, Sugar Boat is a small bistro with a seasonal, locally sourced menu; order the cullen skink, the creamy smoked haddock and potato soup that's a Scottish classic.

The waterfront's centrepiece is Helensburgh Pier, an 800-foot structure that's stood for over two centuries. In its heyday it welcomed several steamships at once and landed herring by the ton; no vessels dock now, but it's still a great spot for views across the Clyde — though note some sections are closed to pedestrians at the time of writing. A mile or so from the centre sits Helensburgh's other big draw: the Hill House, Charles Rennie Mackintosh's early-1900s masterpiece in the Glasgow Style, designed with his wife Margaret Macdonald Mackintosh. A century of wet weather took its toll, so the National Trust for Scotland wrapped the building in an extraordinary steel cage with chainmail mesh walls. It sounds odd, but it means tours now include elevated walkways over and around the multistorey house — a rare perspective on an architectural icon.

If you've got more time, the 34.5-mile Three Lochs Way starts here, linking coastal towns to Scotland's first national park, and you can walk as much or as little of it as you like. Loch Lomond and its villages are a short hop east.

Helensburgh suits travellers who want a low-effort, high-reward day trip or a quiet base for a few days of walking and eating — no car required thanks to the rail links, though one helps for the lochs. Come for the pier and Mackintosh, stay for the seafood.