It was nice on my second and final morning in Lille. The rain had stopped, the sky was bright with patches of cloud, and the sketchers were still everywhere. I walked over to the little patch behind the Treille cathedral, as drawn by pretty much every urban sketcher in this whole Rencontre, and drew the colourful little houses. These narrow little buildings reminded me of the ones I had drawn in Liege a few years ago. As I sat on the little bench, more and more sketchers came and started drawing (there is just one in my picture, there were at least seven or eight just in this view by the time I stopped, but I’d alreayd drawn that bit). I spoke to a couple of them in French, exchanging tips on pens and other art materials. I was going to draw the cathedral itself but the morning was already getting away from me. I had booked a train ticket to Brussels for later that morning.

I did get a couple more quick ones in. This is a Lille fire hydrant, because I have to draw a fire hydrant in each town. I think I have drawn ones like this before in France. You might like to see a Flickr album of my hydrant sketches. Below, a sign I spotted outside one of the ‘estaminets’ (restaurants) nearby, with an example of the local ‘ch’timi’ dialect. It says “Qu’o qu’in minge ichi? Des vraies frites d’ch Nord Chti Miam!!” Now I know you’re thinking “haha, a rude word”. What this actually means is “What can you eat here? Proper fries from the Chti North, yum!” Or something like that. It was time to move on from one place that does great frites to another place that does great frites, Brussels. See you en Belgique.