Here is my last drawing in China – of course at the airport in Beijing. There isn’t much colour…lots of shiny surfaces and grey coloured ceilings and beams. Even the people weren’t that colourful!
Wed-16-Aug-2017
China
479 – The Great Wall
On our last day in China, of course we had to visit the Great Wall. We hired a driver and car who took us to the part at Mutianyu which is supposed to be more rugged and slightly less crowded. We took the Ski lift to the top and a toboggan (sitting on a little cart, running down a metal slide) to get down..which was great fun. We did exert ourselves a bit though by walking along the wall for a few hours. When we took a rest I had a chance to very quickly draw this.
Tue-15-Aug-2017
#478 – Temple of heaven park
This was drawn on our second day in Beijing. On our first day we arrived on an overnight train from Xian and went straight to the Forbidden City only to find unbelievable crowds and that after hours of queuing up they had sold out of tickets (there is a limit of 80,000/day). Although we tried to get tickets for the next day, you can only be sure to get them online and if you are Chinese…not very helpful. So we gave up on the idea and visited the Temple of Heaven instead which was much more manageable. It’s a huge place and has some wonderful buildings – but it was too hot to sketch in the open air!
Mon-14-Aug-2017
#477 – Small wild goose pagoda Xian
Our next stop on our China holiday, after a short flight, was Xian, famous for the teracotta warriors. I didn’t sketch the day we visited the warriors as we were exhausted, but the day afterwards we cycled around the city wall and afterwards visited a pagoda where I drew this.
Sat-12-Aug-2017
#476 – Miles Davis in the teashop
So, after our cruise we had a day in Chongqing and visited a supposedly historic area called Ciqikou (which means Porcelain Port). Although the streets clearly were ancient, they were lined with hundreds of touristy shops and it was very crowded. We took a little rest in a tea shop, decorated with interesting pictures and movie posters, where I sketched this.
Thu-10-Aug-2017
#475 – Docked against the Yangtze Gold 7
This sketch was done on our last day on our Yangtze cruise, when the ship docked next to another one.
Wed-9-Aug-2017
#474 – Fengjie
On the second full day of our Yangtze cruise in China we stopped at Fenjie County, to make an excursion to Fengdu Ghost City – a complex of shrines and temples dedicated to the afterlife. After the visit I took a moment to draw this from our little cabin balcony.
Tue-8-Aug-2017
#473 – Captains reception
Here I am still posting sketching from our China holiday…I hope I’ll catch up soon. This one was done while we were still on our cruise up the Yangtze river…on the first evening all the passengers were invited the the Captain’s reception…where he made a speech and we got free champagne. There were about 400 passengers on the cruise of which only 4 spoke English (that was us)….but they were still kind enough to translate everything into English…just for us!
Mon-7-Aug-2017
#472 – Pathway
Here is another sketch I did of the pathway to the ‘tribe of the three gorges’ – this time just sploshing about the watercolour paint. At the top left was a tiny little pagoda on the peak of the ridge…I’m not sure if the pathway went that far though!
Mon-7-Aug-2017