Astoria Park - Part I

 On Saturday the NYC Urban Sketchers were meeting in person at Astoria Park in Astoria, Queens. With all that had happened with Jerry and then the restrictions from Covid 19 I haven't been able to join the sketchers in person since some time in December of 2019. This was an opportunity that I really wanted to take advantage of because it is a location that we can drive to easily and there is parking. Also it would be a somewhat shorter day of sketching and I could leave Jerry for part of the day. I texted my friend, Suzala to see if she was going and she volunteered to drive if I came to her house. My only hesitancy was the amount of walking it might involve. I had been there before to sketch and knew what the park was like.

It was so great to see the other sketchers! There were probably about 20 of us that showed up and for quite a few of us this was our first meeting since Covid. We've seen each other at Zoom events but not in person. My feeling is that there is a possibility that if the Covid cases start rising again we may be restricted again, so I definitely wanted to do this now while we could. Several of us picked a spot that was along the East River which has views of two bridges, the Triborough Bridge (which I didn't sketch this time) and Hell's Gate Bridge which is below.

We took a break for lunch and some catching up...but I had to walk back up the hill to our meeting location which was worth the hike.