We spent the first day painting in the grounds of the hotel as their lawns and gardens meandered beautifully down to the banks of Lake Windemere. They even had their own jetty off of which Lyndsay managed to loose an entire easel, and as you can see from these photographs some passing canoeists kindly helped rescue it from the shallows of the water. That holiday has to be said was an absolute hoot.  The group quite frankly were just a bunch of mates with which I thoroughly enjoyed spending my time.

Speaking of which I recently caught up with Peter and Lindsay when I was staying at Peters house whilst doing a course in Telford.  Here's us at Mad O'rourke's Pie Factory, believe it or not I abandoned the Atkins diet that night and I ate all of this desperate Dan cow pie.

And speaking of Europe... Well....... what a painting holiday.  Lets start with the statistics shall we,  3000 miles. 5 hotels, 4 countries, 4 languages, 12 painters, 1 mountain biker, and an artist known as Charles Evans.  It was a colossal planning operation to organise all the hotels, the food, the transport and of course the painting locations. 

We had a whale of a time, the locations were superb and the painting some of the most enjoyable I have done. Although it has to be said if we were to do it again, the next time I would choose St Tropez over Nice, Nice is lovely but a bit busy for my liking. Its just one of those places you have to paint before you die.

We started off at the Châteaux for a couple of nights, which never fails.  Then onto Nice, then to Tuscany.

Tuscany was quite simply heaven, the hotel was good, the restaurants and bars around the hotel in Lucca were all well up to expectations. We just quite simply had a fabulous time there.

Then onto Interlaken in Switzerland, this turned out to be an absolutely stupendous hotel the service was superb, I would actually describe as very Germanic, very polite, very courteous and very precise. Switzerland was the biggest surprise to me, because I had never been there before. Yes you have seen the pictures and the movies "the hill are alive" spring to mind, but when you are standing in front of those mountains, its just gob smacking.

Then finally the drive home.  There were a few minor hitches, like for instance, Brett had a problem with his car in Nice, but he got that fixed at the dealership during the day, whilst we were painting so this didn't infringe on any of our time. it just goes to show as I keep telling him Mercedes over Audi every time, but impetuous youth just wont listen.    Brett : "Charlie is due to take delivery of his Audi Q7 shortly.  Hah, now who's laughing"

Next years big holiday is the Grand Cruise, which is fully booked. What on earth are we going to come up with that's Grand in 2011.  Although I am going to India, that could be quite interesting. But that's not one of ours, that one is organised by Rakhi Bansal on 08454 300 107
or email her at rakhi@indianodyssey.co.uk

A huge thank you to those of you who send your photos in for inclusion on the website.

Photos can be viewed here

In between all of the things mentioned I have been just about everywhere and met some lovely people, Lavenham again was a great success and this hotel, The Swan, just never fails to please, the weather was beautiful for the entire week and the painting locations stupendous. In between painting sessions this place is just such a chill out venue. I love it. But I think I have said that before.

Next years Lavenham holiday is already half full.

ADD PHOTOS!!

2009 was our fourth annual open day. We changed very little this year, 1 massive marquee, our catering tent, 2 smaller marquees and the usual demos on the raised patio. This was a great success as ever and true to tradition the weather wasn't kind to us. But part of the beauty of living in England. The hog roast was a phenomenal success, with not a lot of pig left at the end of the day.

Once of the differences this year was also having a crafting tent, we had Carol Hadlow doing her craft and my sister Jane Hammill doing fascinators, which is something to do with hats of some kind. This proved to be really popular, so much so that I'm never ever ever ever EVER going to invite her again!

Carol White was doing demonstrations and using the funny brush, or silly brush or whatever its called and as ever Carol was very popular as she takes a leaf out of my book that paintings should be all about having fun, thank you Carol.

Photos can be viewed here

Another good one was not a holiday or a course organised by us, it was for an Art society in the Stamford / Lincolnshire area called Maxi Art Group.

I usually go there for 4 days and we paint in the immediate area, the past couple of times I have done this course the weather has been absolutely fabulous, a real sun lotion kind of a course. They are always a lovely bunch of people and April Brown does a tremendous job and works very hard at making sure that everything goes without a hitch, even down to sourcing fabulous locations of which I always approve.

I'm not saying that they are a bit posh down there, but some of the houses that Aprils friends live in and which we paint are part of another world.  Look at these photographs.

Thank you yet again April you made my job a delight (she even brings my lunch, how good is that!)

The series will be called "A Brush With Britain" As many of you have seen from the programmes which have been on in the past, nearly all of the programmes have been made in the North East of England. Whereas this next series has been filmed in Scotland, Northumberland, Cumbria, Suffolk, Kent and Tyne & Wear.  We tell the history of the place and interview someone to do with the location and I paint a picture of the location as well. They are due to start going out on Discovery Real Time and The Living Channel on 9th January 2010 and guess what?  Prime time, 8pm on a Saturday night, with another programme on at 8:30 on the other channel.   So I am taking up 8 - 9 every Saturday.

2010 is already shaping up to be a super busy year. The diary is already 75% full.

I had a meeting last week with the publishers at Search Press which was a planning meeting for the new book, which is "Charle's Top Tips in Watercolours". This will be out in the middle of next year. The year has started to wind down now, as you can see I have just started  on a series of Dog paintings,.  The spaniels have just had the treatment and now I must go because my fingers are itching to start on the Labradors.

All in all its been a very very busy but fabulous year, I have met new friends, mixed with lovely people and I am  looking forward to an equally busy 2010. I would like to say a big thank you for all of the warm welcomes I have received at art societies and various groups throughout the country and wish every one, old friends, new friends and people I haven't met yet a very happy Christmas and prosperous New year from Brett and I and everyone at Charles Evans School Of Art and Evans Towers.