Bristol - it's not like it used to be.

Ever since one sold for £1m the whole of the floating harbour seems to be being covered with apartments. Some are ok to look at, some are hideous and some are blocking out the view we used to have of the SS Great Britain.

Dorset

Spent a very enjoyable weekend camping in Dorset. This was the nearest pub to the campsite...

Reverends, thousands of 'em

Here's a couple from the Mendips - I live on the edge of them. The first is the Rock of Ages - there's a song about it. The Rev. Toplady once sheltered there in a storm and later wrote the song. He was a bit dim I reckon as there's a perfectly huge cave just opposite. I'm afraid I didn't capture it very well and got bogged down in the detail. I'll have to try again some time...

In the woods nearby are the ruins of Mendip Lodge - built by Rev. Thomas Whalley in 1787. It was once a very grand Italianate house but sadly there's not much left of it now...

Clarke Bond Building

Another nice building just around the corner. I have a vague recollection that this might have been something to do with Brunel or the SS Great Britain - which is just around the corner, but I might be wrong...

Not sure if adding the streetview thing is a good idea but here it is anyway...


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Pens, lovely pens

My replacement pens arrived today so in celebration here's some interesting industrial buildings near where I work.




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More views from the new building...

I can see the top of this old factory from my desk. I've been experimenting with a double-ended sharpie pen. I like the mixture of thick and thin lines but find the ink bleeds through the paper very easily. Also, I've lost my PITT artisits pen - I really liked it too. I must order some more...
This house is on the other side of the building...

Looking toward Cabot Tower

Here's the view from the top floor of our new building. You can just see the masts of the SS Great Britain, Cabot Tower and the University building at the top of Park Street...

More hanging around the docks

Some of the boats in Bristol docks...

Today I have some hopeless chap from off of the telly...
... and some boats from near where I work...

I watched a little bit of 'Gangs of New York' yesterday. Mostly nonsense but I did like some of the moustaches. Here Daniel Day Lewis's...

Another quick watercolour sketch. This is in Wells - I think it's a tithe barn...

Blimey, 2 posts in 2 days. I was in London today and found some time to experiment a bit more with the watercolours. These took about 35 mins each - except for the girder which was 5 mins. Firstly, Edgware Road Station...

... next, The Grand Junction Arms...
... and a collection of girders supporting the roof of Padington Station...

Langford Court - a big country house near us had an open day at the weekend. After eating cakes in it I did a quick sketch of the orangery with a brush pen.

I've also been tinkering with a pentel water brush and a little set of watercolours. It's quite fun - especially when you're in a nice warm pub...

A week away...

We drove to Freiburg in the black Forest for a week. It was great to be in the mountains and see some proper snow. Didn't get to do as much sketching as I would have liked though. Here's the view from the top of the sledge run in Schauinsland...



And here's the view from the front of the ferry as the other cars board...


A note for you stationary fans... I bought some very nice Faber-Castell PITT Artist Pens - they're like slightly firmer than usual brush pens. I did the top picture with a B size and the bottom one with a huge 'big brush'.

It's a messy job...

Even robots need a lunch break...

This is getting to be a bit of a theme. I'm finding they don't scan very well though.

tiny giant robot

I got a postcard sized block of watercolour paper for christmas. I did this quick doodle of a rather cliched sublect to see how the waterbrushpens worked on it. Watercolours are much more fun on the proper paper - it's pretty rough to draw on though.

I'm not lazy

This weeks sketches are from a pub (I was there for a meeting, honest) and from sitting in front of the tv. It really isn't a good indication of what I do with my life - well not the pub bit anyway.

This is the Hen and Chickens in Bedmister - it's changed a lot since I first arrived in Bristol and is now tastefully decorated and serves tasty pizzas - whereas before it was decorated with sticky carpets and served up regular opportunities for a fight...


These thumbnail sketches were done whilst watching Little Dorrit, Poirot and Never Mind the Buzzcocks...

Tobacco Factory

A quick sketch done in a Bristol cafe which was once a factory.

Norway

I'm just back from spending two weeks teaching at a College in Volda, Norway. It was my first time in this country - somewhere I'd always wanted to visit - and it was a wonderful experience. The landscape is truly stunning, with majestic peaks, steep cliffs that plunge thousands of feet into fjords and distant snow capped mountains. I also found the wooden buildings very interesting. It rained a bit (most days - that's what the splodges on the drawings are) but it didn't spoil it - the autumn colours were spectacular and I met some really great people. I'll post a link to the photos later

my photos

Meanwhile here's a few sketches done with a broad nibbed art pen - I really enjoyed using it - the ink comes out very fast so you have to work equally quickly - and when it's about to rain that's a bonus.

Here's the view from my bedroom - with the steep side of the Rotsethornet on the left - I didn't get to climb up it this time - but I will return...


Volda has an open air museum - a fascinating collection of buildings showing traditional building techniques. The turf roofs were very interesting with a wealth of plants growing above a layer of birch bark...

I think this may have been a small water mill. There's a millstone in front of it and it had a horizontal many-bladed fan underneath it...




I went for a walk up the hill behind the town. There were some very picturesque mossy forest areas with streams and waterfalls. On the way back down I sketched the view over the town - again with the Rotsethornet behind...

The neighbours house had terrific Viking style dragons on the ridge of the roof...

We visited the Briksdal Glacier at the weekend - it's difficult to get an idea of the scale - even in the photos. If you take a picture of the whole thing with someone alongside it they just become a tiny dot. Whilst we were exploring the edge we heard a terrifying crack and far above we could see a few bits fall off - it took a long time for the to reach the bottom. Sadly the glacier is retreating at quite an alarming rate...


This is a typical Norwegian barn. They always have at least one ramp for the farmer to drive his tractor up and drop off er, um, some farm type stuff - straw or cows or something...

The day before I left was very special - some intrepid students agreed to come out for a walk in the rain and we found a reconstruction of a traditional Sami dwelling called a Goahti. The Sami are Reindeer herders from the far North. Ailu was a Sami himself and he quickly got everything in place and a fire lit. There was a table without legs and some decorated reindeer skins to sit on. What a fantastic place for a picnic. This is the view of the front door...


Finally the trip back. I had three planes t catch so I made it into a bit of a sketchcrawl. Here's Aalesund airport at 11AM and Bergen at 12...


This is an old glider, also at Bergen, at 12.30PM...



On the plane, somewhere over the North Sea at 2PM...



And Aberdeen at 3.30PM (my first time in Scotland)...




Other Nordic observations...

- Fish are very important in Norway.
- There doesn't seem to be any crime in Volda - people don't put fences and gates round their houses or businesses and bikes are left unlocked on the street. Or perhaps stealing a bike is pointless. You'd either have to risk getting caught as you cycle slowly up a very steep hill - or end up at the fjord at the bottom of the hill.
- You can't buy alcohol in a supermarket after 6 on a Saturday (bear this in mind if you're invited to a party on a Saturday night and don't want to arrive looking like a beerless cheapskate)
- Most of the TV is taken up by news and current affairs - and most of the news and current affairs is about fish.
- Norwegians are very fit and love the outdoors. Whilst descending a 700m mountain in cold, almost horizontal rain we were overtaken by several joggers, dogwalkers and even a couple with a pram.
- Beer is expensive - almost £5 a pint. The barman will ask you several times if you really wanted 4 glasses before pouring them.
- They recently launched a cruise ship called the 'Hurtegurten'
- Norwegian for fish is 'fisk'

It all seems a long way off now I'm back and working again. I hope I go back again soon.