England

We stopped off in Salisbury only for the afternoon. I had to try painting the cathedral in homage to John Constable, my favorite painter who spent time there and painted it often.

Then we moved to Wells, where I had first been with my grandmother when I was 17. This small town with a stunning cathedral and a footpath right out into the countryside from the back of the Bishop's Palace immediately and enduringly became one of my touchstone, sanctuary places. We also took a side trip to Bath, where I sketched the Royal Crescent (on the right).

The family took another trip out of Wells on our other day in town, but I couldn't bear not to have at least one full day there, so I walked out onto the footpath to Dulcote and drew the cathedral rising up over the fields, one of the most enduring images for me from that trip when I was 17. I also drew a farm at Dulcote that has been in the same family for three generations. I know this because Richard, the current farmer, came to see what I was doing, told me the story of both sides of his family farming that land, and ended up inviting me into tea. I loved having tea in a farm kitchen with three Somerset farmers telling me their stories.

After our time in Wells, I dropped the family off to hike the Thames path while I headed north to revisit Yorkshire. I'd been dreaming of painting there for at least the last five years and was delighted to get the chance. I had a couple of days, though, before my B&B was expecting me, so I stopped in the Peak District in Derbyshire. I stayed in the utterly charming village of Hartington and spent a day and a half walking out on their footpaths to paint. It was stunning, and I now want to go back there and spend more time painting.

I finally got to the North Yorkshire Moors, the landscape that absolutely grabbed me when I was there in university. I've been dreaming of it ever since. I spent five unhurried nights at the delightful Rectory Farms B&B in the tiny village of Levisham. The road behind the pub leads straight up and out onto the moor, and I just walked and painted and hung out with sheep all week. It was everything I had hoped for.