The New Year

ART: I’m starting 2011 by joining “The Sketchbook Challenge” –  a year-long, online project set up by a group of artists to encourage creative journalling/sketchbooking. Each month has a different theme and January’s theme is “Highly Prized”, which is making me consider (and draw) what I value and what’s most important in my life. These musings and scribblings are being recorded in a brand new Sketchbook Challenge sketchbook.

Meanwhile, I’m enjoying adding to my “In and around Koroni and Harakopio” sketchbook, which is a documentary style book recording scenes, events, vistas and places in my local area. You can see some of these sketches in the Gallery section of this website. My sketching partner in crime is Jackie Sherwood, a mixed media artist who’s recently moved to the Koroni area and shares my passion for rural Greece.

WALKING: The first walk of the New Year took place on 8th January, when I led a group of 14 residents, plus dog,  from the mountain village of Kokkino, up the lower slopes of Mount Likodemon and through the abandoned village of Solinari. The weather was absolutely perfect for this time of year – clear and sunny – just right for a 19 kilometer walk. In reccying this walk beforehand, I discovered a nice new track from Kalochori which I plan to use in a future walk, possibly combining it with a visit to another deserted village – Romiri.