My first solo sketching Trip to Puerto Rico

Back in December I found out that I needed to use up my 4 days of vacation at work that month or I would lose it - so of course I decided to use it!

Looking around for things to do, I asked my wife if she wanted to go somewhere. Since we recently got 2 kittens, we couldn't leave them alone so she decided to stick around.

Thus my first ever solo sketching trip!

I was super excited and looked everywhere for all possibilities but had a few criteria that was important to me. 

I wanted to be:

1. a warm place so I could sketch outside.
2. a place I can walk around everywhere and not have to drive.
3. a place where there's a direct flight from Boston.
4. a place that was pretty inexpensive to travel to.

 After lots of searching Puerto Rico rose to the top! specifically "Old San Juan".

If was also off season making everything cheap as well as having mile points saved up that I could use!

2 weeks later I was in Old San Juan sketching my first subject at the hotel:

 

In total I was able to do 35 sketches and had an amazing 4 days.

Here are a few scans from my sketchbook.

Excited by the trip, after coming home I started working on my 6th book.
To keep the book as raw as possible, I kept all the content as is but only rewrote my hand written letters to make it much more legible- Hope that helps readers want to read my text a little bit more :)

Now available through Amazon.

My 5th book: Urban Sketching (My Journey to) Machu Picchu

Machu Picchu - One of the New Seven Wonders of the World is an unbelievable place - a place you almost have to see for yourself to truly believe. I still remember the first time seeing a photo of the 15th century Inca site located high up in the mountain ridge not being able to believe such a place existed in this world.

For 8 years my wife and I kept on doing research in wanting to go but and kept on postponing the trip since it seemed quite difficult to get there and the altitude sickness seemed to be common with travelers not being able to enjoy the trip. In spring of 2015, we finally made it out there guided by our good friend and travel expert helping us safely get there and not get sick!

All I could say is that the trip was just amazing. Our initial expectations were high to begin with but it even exceeded those high expectations.

This 74 page book captures the exact route we took, what transportation methods we used, what hotels we stayed in, what altitudes were in each location and how we avoided getting altitude sickness. All this information along with all the on-location sketches I did (along with some photos) are bundled into this one book. I truly hope there is something fun or informational in this book for everyone!

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

My book at the The Bostonian Society Gift Shop

Last month I released my 4th book 'Urban Sketching The Freedom Trail' via Amazon.

2 day later I received an email from the Director of Marketing of Revolutionary Boston - an organization part of The Bostonian Society, a 128 year old institution dedicated to studying and preserving Boston's history. They found my book online and was interested in selling them in their gift shops - I was thrilled!

I delivered a box of 36 copies last week as a test trial and went to go see how they were selling this memorial day weekend.

They have 4 gift shops located in The Old State House, Faneuil Hall and Quincy Market - All shops located right on the Freedom trail. A perfect location for my book.

Here are photos from my gift shop tour!

The Old State House museum:

Inside Faneuil Hal:

and in Quincy Market:

This was a very exciting day for me and I can't wait to hear how well it sells.
If this test sell turns out well, we talked about printing in larger volumes (which would bring the piece cost down) as well as printing on higher quality paper and possibly as a hard cover.
It would be an amazing experience to have my book printed and sold in large volumes!

For out of town people interested in this book, you can find it on Amazon: