Les Matelots

My star purchase at the recent Birmingham Toy Soldier Show was this batch of Starlux French sailors.  You might remember I picked up a quartet of similar figures last year so I was delighted to find these.

As well as the more usual musicians there are officers,  deck guards, signallers and this chap carrying a large shell.

The several musicians have considerable panache!

Sambre 57BC - part 1

This was another game played on Hexon terrain tiles with 25mm toys from my collection.  The original scenario notes can be found here.

Here are some of the Romans (X Legion and chums) with their part-built camp.

Many of the Romans came from a recent purchase.  I did my usual repair work and rebasing before applying a coat of Ronseal.

They don't look bad.

The chaps waggling their pila (or pilums?) are old Garrison figures I've had for some time.. I used them to represent the veteran legions.

And here come the hairy types!

The first lot of Belgians crosses the river and beats up some Roman light troops

Others followed and soon the Roman left was very messy...

...but X Legion saw off all who tried.

The Romans strengthen the line during a brief lull in the proceedings.

More on this soon.

Big Guards

Following on from my 1/32 scale Guards are these 1/1 scale versions I spotted during a recent visit to Windsor.  I wish I could paint 'em this well!







Youtube linky

A pair of old French smoothies

No - not Messieurs Aznavour and Trenet but rather this pair of old 1/43 scale Solido diecasts which I picked up on eBay to serve as staff cars for my Little Cold Wars French forces.  

One of the many joys of Solido models is that they are usually quite easy to dismantle for repainting and maintenance work.  So it was with these models - a Citroen CX and a Peugeot 504 wagon.  I was keen to preserve the considerable chrome plated areas while the stripped body parts were sprayed a rather fetching dark green.

After reassembling them I painted on the number plates - such as they are - and then sat back to admire them.  As it happens I have run three 1/1 scale Peugeots - two 104SL and a 309GL - but the 504 was never a common sight on British roads.  I never quite managed to buy a CX but came close on two occasions before my courage failed me and I bought Volvos instead.  To date my only Citroen was a BX which to be honest wasn't great.  It was replaced with - you guessed it - a Volvo.