Month: September 2018

I don’t know that I have anything new to say about how much am I enjoying my drawing hikes. Each time I go just reinforces the fact that it has become my favorite thing to do. And I think my most recent drawing is improved over previous attempts.

This past weekend I went home to western North Carolina for a quick visit and to take my niece on a horseback ride around the Moses Cone Estate in Blowing Rock. I had never been on a horse before (don’t think I had ever even touched one) so I excited for a new experience. During my childhood our family walked around Bass Lake on the estate often. I remember not only the walks, but also the sense of magic I felt there. Though I cannot recall the details the feeling and mood of the fanciful stories I would make up about the fairies and other little folk that inhabited the lily pads, moss covered rocks, and trees with perfectly shaped and sized openings for their doorways are still clear. I also remember seeing the horses and their riders pass by on the far side of the lake on their way through the maze and up to Flat Top Manor. As a little girl I wondered what that might be like, now I know.  My niece and I had a wonderful time on our 2 1/2 hour ride. The weather was perfect and after I got over my initial nervousness it was nice to watch the scenery as we slowly meandered up the path. But as fun as it was I found I missed the connection with the trail and the sites along it that I feel when walking on my own two feet, as well as the ability to set my own pace.

On my way back to Georgia the next day I decided I should take try and fit in a walk and some drawing. At first it seemed like all the waterfalls were in the opposite direction of my route, or at least required quite the detour, but it turns out that Linville Falls could not have been more on my way. Back in college I went camping in the gorge a couple of times, but I had never been to the falls. They were the perfect choice, a non-strenuous walk on wide well-maintained trails to breathtaking overlooks. I spent about an hour at the Emerson’s View overlook doing a pencil sketch of the falls, then visited the other overlooks and spent another hour working in oil crayons on a drawing of the rock formations at the top of the falls. There were more fellow site-seers than I usually see in Georgia, but once I got in the zone of drawing I did not even notice them. I know I keep saying this, but it really was a perfectly lovely experience. There are two more trails that start at the visitor’s center so next trip to NC I would like to try one or both of them. I may need to start padding all my trips with extra time for walking and drawing.

The summer between my seventh and eighth grade years my father taught a landscape painting workshop as part of Appalachian Summer. I am sure there was a classroom part of the class but my memories are of the time we spent painting outside. I have incredibly clear recollections of a day by the duck pond, an afternoon sitting on the rocks at Howard’s Knob and another at an old farm out in the county somewhere. After a hot water heater leak a few years ago I went through and piles of old art work and found several examples of the paintings I did that summer. Most of them were obviously done by a child. The lines and shapes seem a bit choppy, but some the compositions were actually quite good. This I think is due to the fact that one of the first things Dad had us all do was take a piece of mat board and cut a rectangular window in it. These were our viewfinders and we took them with us on each excursion. Before we ever sketched a single line on our paper we would slowly move our rectangles around the landscape trying to find the perfect slice of the scene from among the limitless possibilities. It made a huge difference. It helped find the right image to start with, but also made sketching the initial lines simpler, and as the painting progressed it could be held up again and again to verify details of the scene.

I do not often think of the long ago course (could it really have been 30 years ago?) or the lessons I learned in it, but this past Saturday sitting drawing at Duke Creek Falls I realized I should still be trying to apply them. As I set on the steps leading down to observation decks I was overwhelmed by the view in front of me. Duke Creek Falls is not just one waterfall, it really is falls, plural. My eye did not know where to rest, and my first drawing reflects that. There is no focal point, no organization of the composition. It is confusing and lacks a sense of depth. If I had brought a viewfinder with me I think I would have done a much better job. My second drawing I tried to limit myself more, to focus in on one part of the falls. I even used my hands to make a little rectangle to try and plan what I would include. It is a more successful drawing compositionally. I am going to make myself a viewfinder this week and keep it in my hiking backpack. Hopefully next weekend’s drawings will be markedly improved.

But even though this past Saturday’s drawings were not among my best the walk itself was. Where Panther Creek and Raven Cliffs were true hikes, each several miles in with narrow and steep portions, Duke Creek has a wide and smooth walking path that is just a little over a mile long. There are stairs in the steep places and observation decks around the falls. There was only one other car in the parking lot when Max and I arrived. We made the whole walk down without seeing another soul. Until this week I had never heard of Forest Bathing, but I am in agreement with the adherents and researchers that “if a person simply visits a natural area and walks in a relaxed way there are calming, rejuvenating and restorative benefits to be achieved.”

When we arrived at the falls there was a couple there with their little dog, who was not fond of Max, so we explored around the observation decks a while. A large portion is blocked off because of storm damage.  The spot where the tree came through the deck would have been the perfect place to sit and draw the dramatic view of the water finding many ways to come down the side of the mountain. If I had not had Max with me I might have sat there anyway. But even though I may be brave enough to climb over barriers and check out the damage I would not want to risk Max getting too close to the edge and falling off, and I wasn’t eager to get fussed at by a ranger either. I do not know if they enforce the $500 fine for getting off the trail, but I do not wish to find out. We took some pictures and then went back to the “safe” areas. The benches on the lower observation decks did not offer the views I wanted to draw. We ended up sitting on the stairs leading down to them which was very comfortable until other folks started arriving. Then we may have been in their way, but I just held Max close to me as they passed and no one complained. There were far fewer people than at either Raven Cliff or Panther Creek. I do not know if it was because the site is not as popular or because it is after Labor Day. I drew for about an hour and twenty minutes then we walked back up at a nice relaxing pace.