This is a view of Porto, the second city of Portugal, from where I have just returned after taking part in the 9th Urban Sketching Symposium. I was away for three weeks, visiting family in London, spending a few days in Madrid, sketching the hell out of Porto, before flying back to America from Lisbon. While not as epic or multi-countried as my 1998 trans-European train trip, which I should really do a blog post about, I slept in nicer places, there were no night trains and I filled a whole sketchbook. It will take me a while to scan them all, finish off unfinished sketches, organize my notes and thoughts, and I am still dealing with jet-lag and a truly enormous inbox, as well as the readjustment from being a sketch-constantly-everywhere person to a, well, ok I do sketch a lot anyway, but lots of other things too. Porto was amazing, a really sketchable city, with epic vistas and accompanying steep streets and pathways. My legs were hurting a lot. They are very strong now. Portugal left its mark on me but I am really bad at Portuguese. I did a lot of sketching, both in pen (architecture) and in pencil (people). You can check out the sketches of everyone else on all the various social media platforms by searching for #USkPorto2018, Urban Sketching Symposium, #USkSymposium, and if you want to see what I posted photos of you can check out my Instagram page (yeah I have one of those, though I still feel like I’m not getting it right) at https://www.instagram.com/pwscully/. I’m looking forward to sharing my sketches here, and my stories and thoughts too, and will do my best to make it concise and not nonsensical at all, but as Han Solo once said, “Hey, it’s me!” He also said “Don’t Get Cocky.” He also said “No match for a good blaster at your side kid,” which I will adapt by replacing the word ‘blaster’ with ‘sketchbook’. Oh, I also drew a LOT of fire hydrants…