On January 21, we had our first regular sketchcrawl of the year. It was cold and intermittently rainy, so our surprisingly large group sheltered in a cafe at SW 2nd & Taylor, a place I walk past every day on my way to work …

then under the ramparts of the World Trade Center, where my company holds its quarterly meetings…

and in more cafes, this time with a view of Portlandia.

Lately I’ve felt absorbed by work and health improvement projects, so it is a particularly good time to go out with the sketchers, enjoy the good company, and get back to thinking visually!

I spent most of January studying some tech stuff for work, developing comics ideas, and managing a sick cat.  However, some regular sketching did get done as well.

New Year’s Day was very cold but I made sure to do one urban sketch in the Close-In Southeast industrial area.

Bill Sharp invited the Portland urban sketchers to his lovely studio, where we had a great time talking art, snacking, and sketching each other.

Bill took pictures and caught me in a sketch!

I managed to spend some weekend afternoons at cafes and did quick sketches while working on comics projects…

…and also did one quick sketch at the Horse Brass Pub.

Tomorrow I’ll post about the January sketchcrawl a couple of weeks ago.  Gotta get caught up!

Last Sunday, Dr. Sketchy’s monthly figure drawing event at Crush Bar featured Wonder Woman! Which is awesome on its own, but more awesome because it was in support of Women of Wonder Day, a charity auction benefiting domestic violence prevention and recovery programs. I got out my Noodler’s Flex Pen stocked with Noodler’s Black Swan in Australian Roses ink.

The Wonder Woman theme was fun.  The model was a whole lotta curves and struck some great poses.

Crush Bar is a great venue for Dr. Sketchy, though I do wish they’d get better lighting in place.

Some of us Portland Urban Sketchers tagged along with the Portland branch of ASIFA (Association International du Film d’Animation) for a Halloween Drink ‘n Draw at The Peculiarium in Northwest Portland!

The ASIFA folks set up three light tables, and we were all encouraged to take turns making 10 frames of animation, following their simple guidelines.  Alanna, Tad, and I each did one set.  At the end, more experienced animators connected the end of each series with the beginning of the next to make seamless loops, after which we got to watch what we had done on the projection screen!  It was awesome; I look forward to trying this again now that I have a little bit of a feel for how it turns out.

Here are some ASIFA folks at work on their animation frames (surrounded by grotesque masks)…

The Peculiarium is a crazy place – an art gallery of the weird and macabre combined with a candy shop/novelty store/snack bar that will sell you meal worms to sprinkle on your ice cream, which you can eat as you stick your head up through the hole in the alien autopsy table.

Thanks for the fun, ASIFA, and thanks for the weird environs, Peculiarium!

I woke up before dawn to take the first Underground train to London St. Pancras to catch the early (cheapest) Eurostar train to Brussels.  The ride was smooth and uneventful.

Before moving on to my hostel in Ghent, I put my luggage in a locker at Brussels Midi and set out to start getting to know Brussels.  The area of Brussels Midi is quite grimey and the architecture bland, but after a few blocks of walking towards the city center I encountered this amazing used graphic novel store.  Do you see the stacks and stacks of books? The store was full of piles of books by unfamiliar artists and authors, all in Dutch or French.  Amazing!

Then I started noticing comics-style murals peaking out on stray bits of wall.

Before leaving Brussels, I’d also hit its most famous comic book store (Brusel) and would take note of graphic novels in the windows of many corner stores and tourist shops.  It was wonderful to see graphic novels and comics-style art playing such a prominent role for the city.

Then I hit the tourist center, Groet Markt, which is gorgeous – the intricacy of these towering guildhouses was truly awesome. I have never seen such grand ancient architecture in the form of something besides a castle or church.

After tracking down an English-language guide book and a few other essentials, I wound my way back to the station and continued to my destination, Ghent. There I caught a tram and walked a short ways along a canal to find the EcoHostel Andromeda! It’s the black barge past the white boat.

Here’s the common room.

After dropping off my things I headed downtown to start getting my bearings in this city where I would be spending the next four days.  I was not disappointed! Ghent’s town center is highly compact and full of amazing 13th-15th century architecture, yet magically there seem to be as many students as tourists so it feels very comfortable.

I took a boat tour which included tourists from France, Spain, and Germany – so the tour guide gave his spiel in all three of those languages… plus English!

Here are some preliminary attempts to sort out the shapes of this city… as well as the shape of my beer.

Sunday morning would have been a great time to sketch, since my friends were busy – but it ended up one of those “comedy of errors” mornings.  Had to just go with the flow.  I jotted this one down while passing the Tower of London…

…and ended up taking a river boat tour to Greenwich. The river view was mostly ugly condos with rich people in them, but it did open my eyes to some of the different neighborhoods adjacent to the Thames – for instance, this area which is maybe Wapping or Limehouse or both, who knows. I’d love to explore the area on foot and stop in at the Captain Kidd pub.

I ended up in Greenwich and then walked back towards London by going UNDER the Thames!  Didn’t even know that was possible on foot. Lots of folks were navigating the narrow staircases carrying bikes.

Then I was back with Lynn for another London Walk, “The Unknown East End”.  The Walk was fun, but to be honest the most fun was walking around Brick Lane and Spitalfields after Louise met up with us again.  Brick Lane is thick with stylish young people all very carefully adorned.  There were also men trying to fill the seats of the many Bangladeshi restaurants, calling out greetings and promises and special offers. We went into a restaurant L&L had been to before and it was amazing – really, really wonderful food, something like Indian food but up the flavor and richness and smokiness and the types of naan on the menu.  Man!  I could hang out on Brick Lane for A WHILE.

I can’t really tell you why I wanted my photo taken in front of the paper bag store.

Lynn and Lou did some skillfully executed pointing and peering.

We explored a few pubs, looking for one that might carry unusual beers – didn’t really find that but wound up at The Royal Oak which was quite nice.

On the way home we passed the Shard, which – at this particular moment in its construction – is looking like a very very tall Dalek. Wish my camera could have done better with this shot.

We had to say our goodbyes that night, as I’d be leaving for Belgium before daybreak.

These three days in London made a big impact on me.  London has my dear, brilliant, kind, warm, hilarious friends in it.  London has the British Museum, where I could sketch madly for many days.  London encompasses many distinct, gorgeous, vibrant neighborhoods, easily missed in such a vast city yet each a unique destination on its own once you know to look for it.

I hope very much to make it back soon.

Before embarking upon this vacation, I had mentioned to Lynn and Lou that time would need to be set aside for sketching as we spent time together in London.  They were totally flexible and supportive, and yet… when it came down to it, I chose to take a little break.  The London segment of this vacation didn’t produce a lot of drawings, but I’m very happy with what it did produce: good times with friends, and a new relationship with the city itself.

For me, London is just too big and busy to make any sense of as a visitor.  This started to change when L&L brought me to Borough Market on a Saturday morning.  In Portland we have a very fine farmer’s market, but Borough Market (while equally crowded) was very special and surprising.

Pimm’s cups!

Thai food, on a vast scale!

Bread and sweets! Do you see that fat stack of English muffins?

Finally L&L insisted we visit Neal’s Yard Dairy for some cheese.  This moment was to change my (cheese) life.

Turns out Neal’s Yard is quite world famous, and the cheese we tasted and liked best (Montgomery Cheddar) happens to be the favorite cheese of many a connoisseur.  A cheesemonger at our local cheese shop, Cheese Bar in Portland, said if he could travel anywhere in the world, it would be to Neal’s Yard.

The entire Borough neighborhood is lovely, and (not surprisingly) was used for some scenes in Harry Potter.  London as a whole is too much to take in, but this little neighborhood alone feels whole unto itself, and I could imagine blocking out the chaotic roar of Greater London for a few days to be a tourist in Borough.

Next we went on a London Walks expedition. L&L had been on several of these and enjoyed them all.  We chose “Little Venice” and explored along the easily-overlooked canal system that winds all through London.

We ended up at The Prince Alfred afterwards, a wonderful pub and extremely English.

Inside it was all fancy wooden architectural mazes, so you had to duck frequently just to move about the bar, but once you got settled there was a sense of privacy within the comfort of the communal space.  Quite alluring, really.  I had the Young’s Double Chocolate Stout.

That guy visible on the right?  I like to imagine that’s actually Mark Sheppard.

I did try to get a quick sketch but man it was complicated.

Later we went to the Anchor & Hope restaurant and had a really lovely and unusual dinner (including “Queen of Puddings”) but failed to get good pictures. Highly recommended!

I would have only one more day in London, but by the end of this day my list had grown exponentially instead of getting even slightly shorter.  That’s frustrating in a way, but also a very good thing.

I took the Caledonian Sleeper to London.  The ride was so smooth that departure wasn’t even noticeable; our movement down the rails was indistinguishable from the relaxing vibration of the train resting at the platform.  At some point in the night I was conscious enough to suspect we were in the London area (based on increased bumps in the ride), which was confirmed when the attendant delivered the morning coffee as a way of announcing that we had in fact arrived at London Euston.  After the coffee, we were permitted to take our time getting up and leaving; there was no rushed exit.  Sweet! I just wish there had been a shower.

Lynn and Lou wouldn’t be able to meet up with me until that evening, so I checked my now overstuffed bag into “left luggage” and went wandering out into the streets.  To be honest,  I wasn’t very excited about visiting London itself – I’ve been there before, done the basic sightseeing, and generally found it overwhelming and somewhat generically urban compared to my beloved Scottish cities.  (This attitude would change before my departure!) My main purpose in town was to see Lynn and Lou, and no plans had been made beyond that. Still, it was a lovely day and I was on vacation in one of the great metropolises of the world!

After taking advantage of a blessedly cheap internet cafe, I just walked randomly until I spied this monstrosity peaking out from behind some more humble structure…

Then did a double take because the humble structure in front turned out to be the British Library. That’s THE British Library.  Which is free to enter, and currently featuring an exhibit on science fiction. Besides the decorative crashed saucer and Police Box in the exhibition space, there were some gorgeous vintage book covers and illustrations; you can find them (and many more) at the British Library’s print shop.  Very inspiring! Then I explored the rest of the Library.  Not bad, London… I wandered randomly in your streets for five minutes, and ended up viewing gorgeous early sci fi illustrations, the Lindisfarne Gospels, the Magna Carta, a Mervyn Peake exhibit, and draft pages from Phillip Pullman’s The Golden Compass.

After some time in the Library I felt ready to do some actual “urban sketching” and settled in for this street scene.  Unfortunately my brush pen ran out of ink, oh no!

This sketch marks the only time someone *in a car* would yell to me… “what are you sketching?” I answered, “those buildings over there!” “Can we see?”  I showed them.  ”Cheers!  Good luck!” …and the light had changed, and they were off.

I saw signs pointing towards the British Museum, so figured it was kismet. My first stop was the Museum cafe, but then it was time for some ancient statues (and tourists).

Here’s where I started to get a lot of attention.  While drawing Seated Sakhmet (above), at one point I looked up to my left and there was a gigantic camera *right next to my head* focused on my page.  I turned to my right, and there was another gigantic camera focused down on me and my page from above.  This was a little disconcerting, but got me thinking about why people would turn their cameras on me, when surrounding by all these great antiquities of the world.

We all, as tourists, want to connect with the place we’ve found.  We want to be part of a story that binds us to the place forever.  Urban Sketchers have a great advantage in that we know we can bind ourselves to places by sketching them.  Now that I have sketched Seated Sakhmet, I feel like we’re partners in a way – we know each other, we get along, we’re part of a shared story.  Many tourists try to get this feeling by snapping photos or video of her, but I think it is harder that way – it’s too easy to forget to focus your mind at the same time as you focus your camera, and you can arrive home to find your SD card full but your memories empty.  These people came to the British Museum to see art, but didn’t know how to be part of it; I think that is why they wanted to photograph me sketching.  Now they had a story – “In the British Museum I came upon this artist, sketching” – my presence gave them an anchor in time and space, which perhaps helps them to connect to the space themselves.

I feel blessed to have found a way to forge a strong bond to my environment, and proud to have something to offer these strangers as an incidental bonus of fulfilling my own desire.

The British Museum was calling for at least 5 more days,  but my time for this day was up so it would have to wait until my NEXT vacation to the UK.  I adventured through the Underground and navigated unfamiliar London streets to find Green & Stone, a gorgeous little art store jam-packed with paint-stained easels, shelves and shelves of sketchbooks, tiny beautiful vials of ink – it’s an artist’s art store for sure, and old-timey as all get-out.

After that I found Lynn & Lou’s house, and we spent the evening catching up and having really lovely tapas at Mar I Terra. I’ll leave the rest of the details of our visit private, summarizing simply as this:  the decade that had passed since we last met felt like nothing, and my evening spent with dear friends was precious and wonderful.

I woke up to a beautiful morning in Glenfinnan and headed straight up the hillside to sketch. It was quiet and fresh and sunny and I was alone with these views – magic.

Hmm. Sometimes the most beautiful, harmonious scenes feel the most challenging to draw.

I had problems with the Viaduct as well, though it sure was nice to sit by it in the sunshine.

While I was sketching, I caught a glimpse of a small brown figure moving among the grasses.  A chipmunk perhaps?  But no – it looks more like a tiny ferret!  Later in the day the woman at the tourist information desk confirmed this is actually a baby pine marten, not often seen during daylight hours.  Hi there, little fella!

After having trouble with these sketches I headed down to the main tourist area for Glenfinnan – the Glenfinnan Monument, which memorializes the place where Bonnie Prince Charlie first raised his standard to rally the Highlanders to the Jacobite cause.  As I settled in for a larger watercolor, I was frequently visited by large dragonflies which seem to do well in this boggy territory.

I paused  a moment to catch the passing of the Jacobite train upon the viaduct…

And then for awhile I just wandered around in the nearby woods imagining what this place might have been like in 1745 filled with impassioned Highlanders, and I sang folk songs about Bonnie Prince Charlie.

If you had seen my Charlie at the head of an army
He was a gallant sight to behold
With his fine tartan hose on his bonnie round leg
And his buckles all a pure shining gold

The tartan my love wore was the finest Stuart kilt
And his soft skin all under it as white as any milk
It’s no wonder that seven hundred Highlanders were killed
In returning my Charlie to me

My love was six foot two, without stocking or shoe
In proportion my true love was built
Like I told you before upon Culloden Moor
Where the brave Highland army was killed

Prince Charlie Stuart was my true love’s name
He was the flower of England, a pride to his name
But now they have banished him over to Spain
And so dear was my Charlie to me.

–Prince Charlie Stuart, as sung by Steeleye Span

I had a good time doing that.

As I enjoyed the fine weather, I walked quite a bit around the area and sometimes my feet got ahead of me, sometimes it gets harder to slow down to sketch.  I wish I’d taken the time to sketch this cathedral and its lovely lampposts and surroundings.

Somehow a fair bit of time must have passed because now my photos and sketch seem to show it’s getting on towards evening.

I had to head back to the bunkhouse, collect my things, and leave it behind.

While waiting for the train to Glasgow, I chatted with a real trainspotter, a fellow that volunteers with a Welsh steam train organization and who was taking a train-oriented vacation with his supportive family.  His hip-looking teenage son kept interrupting him to correct his facts about trains!  That was really charming.  He said they recently had a concert in Wales where several steam trains were pulled up and a musical piece was performed on their whistles.

And then I was off to catch the Caledonian Sleeper train to London, where I would rendezvous with dear friends for the weekend before continuing on to Belgium.

Leaving Skye was bittersweet.  It felt like a relief to leave a place where the bus schedule and weather had interfered so much with my sketching plans, yet on the other hand the skies had cleared and as my bus careened around Skye’s hillsides towards the ferry port, tantalizing vistas appeared and disappeared.  Like I said, this is a place that earned a strong position on my “Return, and Do It Right This Time” list.

Along the way I enjoyed chatting with a couple of Americans about travel, veganism (they were vegan and said it hadn’t been as difficult in Scotland as it might have been),  and that state of mind you get to in your older age where you realize you only have so much time left, and if there’s something you really want to do, you better get out there and do it.  Yep.

The ferry ride was lovely. I spent much of the time up on deck enjoying the sky and the water, but liked this photo from inside the cabin best.

In Mallaig I tried to do a quick sketch of the ferry from a nearby cafe, but it left mid-sketch.

Then it was time for the train.  Arriving at the station, I had a little regret that I had not elected to arrange for a ticket on the Jacobite steam train which runs the same line, but it was expensive and I had figured better to see it from the outside, right?  In any case, even if your train is just a normal train, the journey from Mallaig to Fort William is considered by many to be the most lovely train journey in the UK.  I tried to snap a few photos through the window.

There’s something about these highland landscapes that drives me crazy, I love it so much – the water, the steep slopes, the colors, the hints of other peaks beyond.  It feels like exactly where I want to be.

Saying my goodbyes to the Americans who were on their way to Fort William, I rolled my luggage to the train door in preparation to exit the train at Glenfinnan.  The conductor came over and said something in Scottish.  Recognizing that I hadn’t understood, he repeated it.  Something about crossing over the tracks quickly or I’d be stuck for an hour?  I kept thinking I hadn’t understood, because why would I need to cross the tracks quickly?

Well, here’s why.

That’s my train, on the left.  Since the platforms at this small station aren’t long enough for the steam train, they had to stop it a little short, let me cross over from the other side, then they pulled the steam train further up so that its passengers could get out.

The Jacobite train is a beautiful machine, most famous right now for its acting role as Hogwarts Express, just as this region around Glenfinnan is the incredibly beautiful area through which the Hogwarts train passes.  It’s seen most clearly while Harry and Ron are having their adventure in the flying car (video here).  Is it just me or does the gorgeous scenery steal the scene a little bit there?

I caught a quick sketch on the platform as the train was getting ready to depart…

…and then the train pulled out, making that wonderful steam engine chugging sound.

The fellow at the station led me down to the station bunkhouse and dining car, which looked very similar to the cars of the steam train I had just been sketching. What a beautiful area, what a great place to sleep!  I was already a little bit in love with Glenfinnan at this point (only about 30 minutes into my visit), and knew I would have to move fast to explore it since this would be my last night in Scotland for this trip.  Can you hear my heart preemptively breaking?  I never do well at leaving Scotland, and I’ve had some practice at it.

The skies seemed to be holding back the rain for the moment so I took a gamble with heading out for a walk up the hill. Immediately, I was mentally swearing like a sailor – not from any trouble but from the sheer awesome beauty of this place.

I got quite muddy on this walk and was worrying a little about having any wearable clothing for the next day… but I was having a great time.

I tried to take a self portrait but it wound up blurry…

…and I made a friend, do you see him?  We had a little communion across a roadway later in the walk.

Then, there was rain.  Buckets of it.  Still, I walked a fair bit – around the viaduct, down towards Glenfinnan Hotel and the pier where boat tours normally depart, but the entire area was extremely flooded and then we were getting flooded from above as well!  I did locate the local post office.

Arriving back at the bunkhouse, I was soaked to the bone and had to switch to my other pants and sandals while my jeans and boots took a turn in the bunkhouse’s “drying closet”.  I went for a snack in the dining car and sketched this view from the window.  Seriously, folks.

Here’s the inside of the dining car, looking towards the kitchen area and the glass case with the pastries.

Back in the sleeping car, I sketched the very busily attended bird feeder from the lounge area, and then a view of a sleeping compartment.

In the evening I went to the nearby Princes House Hotel, whose chef is apparently “award winning” and indeed the food was good. I felt like having some familiar delicious flavors, so enjoyed some Laphroaig and Bowmore with a lovely snack and sticky toffee pudding.

This fellow in the kilt with the beer, scotch, AND laptop turned out to be in the tourist industry, obviously a well known personality at this particular hotel.

Upon returning to the bunkhouse, I ended up sharing some MORE whisky with a Scottish hillwalker who happened to have a bottle of Glenfiddich stuffed in his bags.  We discussed the relative merits of Speysides vs. Islays, and soon we were joined by a talkative munro bagger who was at least 70 years old and happy to hold forth on any topic; then a few more munro baggers showed up and it was all about walking adventures.  Eventually I tagged out to enjoy my wee bunk in my wee sleeping compartment.

Glenfinnan was good to me that first day, even if it did dump rain.  Weather report for the next day was promising some sunshine, could I be so lucky?