A Visit to the City by the Bay...

Catching up on a very busy year so far!  A short trip to San Francisco in January brought me back to my beloved "City by the Bay"...I lived there years ago, in another era, when the tech boom was just getting underway.  Parts of the city have been transformed beyond all recognition, especially downtown south of Market, mind-bending for someone who lived there over 20 years ago!  I enjoyed seeing the beautiful new SFMOMA, and visiting the old...like the Sutro Baths at Lands End and that eternally glorious Golden Gate Bridge...

The trip began with a pre-dawn ride to LAX on a damp freeway, sketching with ink washes and a neon brush marker...

                                                        ...and every airport visit is an opportunity to sketch people waiting!

One of my favorite parts of San Francisco is Lands End...the beautiful shoreline at the mouth of the Golden Gate, and I went there first to do some sketching in ink with quick watercolor washes.  A view here overlooking the ruins of the Sutro Baths.  I had almost forgotten how green San Francisco can be...that true green that we seldom see in Los Angeles...

 It seemed to be date night on Wednesday at Fiorella, a great Clement Street neighborhood Italian restaurant...










I was very happy to meet San Francisco Urban Sketchers Laurie Wigham and Kathy McAuliffe (aka Gus McDuffie) who kindly took time off to meet me at the Ferry Building, to see the King Tide, expected to rise to street level that day!  Not only did we see the King Tide, I managed to drop my sketchbook in it, while sketching the spectacular view of the Bay Bridge!  I fished it out, and kept going...but if you see the ghost of "Rorschach" in the center, that's why...

Feeding giant-sized gulls at the Ferry Building...

A walk through the new (to me) SoMA district in sprinkling rain (San Francisco, of course!) to visit the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art--fantastic!  No sketching except with a pencil, I was told, so we went to the museum's lovely cafe for some sketching...several members of the cafe staff came to investigate, and made us feel very welcome.  A view to the courtyard here...

I was in San Francisco that week to help review Bay Area high school portfolios for the college where I teach, so not much more sketching...but I just couldn't leave without a morning visit to Golden Gate Bridge!  How do you sketch an icon, without getting a "postcard view"?  I played with some thumbnails...finding a color pencil that was just the right golden-red...

A last quick close-up view of the entrance to the Bridge on the San Francisco side, and those weather-toughened trees I love very much--they seem to have the character of Northern California that I really miss!