Salon de Guerre/Wargames Room renovation IV

Today I started to add the Moloton (wall fabric underlay) and the 18th century reproduced fabric for the walls. Nessa commenced the restoration of the chandelier which was completed this afternoon.

Really happy with the 18th century reproduction fabric and how it looks with the gold and grey/white walls. Tomorrow I will erect the chandelier and complete the fabric on the 5x2 m wall.

Cheers
Matt

Wargames Room / Salon de Guerre III

Yesterday I had my premier game in the partially finished “Salon de Guerre” with our week long holiday guest Chris Pringle   (Author of Bloody Big Battles) and his wife. A very delightful visit and a great rapid fire game to bless the room.

We decided to play a battalion of British paras with a support company holding the village to prevent the Germans from exiting the table. The Wehrmacht forces were two battalions of infantry, one stug and a recon light armoured car coy, plus a coy of recon mechanised infantry, commands by a RHQ.

Chris really used his battalion artillery well along with his mortars first to lay smoke to make his assault on the defending Brits, then to pound the paras until they were pinned. Eventually he assaulted the village after losing two companies pushed or destroyed the remaining Brits out capturing before the allotted 15 turns.

 

Cheers

Matt

Ardenne Abbey, Normandy

Working on my unpainted building pile and I decided to paint my Ardenne Abbey after visiting in May. I purchased the 20mm Raventhorpe Model some time ago and have never really got around to building it. I plan to build the main buildings surrounding the abbbey in 20mm so a lot to cram onto a 600 x 600 terrain board. The main features are the tithe barn, the grand gate and the port gate, along with the gardens. As the piece will only feature on some games I thought that the only permanent pieces will be the hedges and fences, and the gardens, so I can swap out for a chateau or something else on the tile also.
A feature around the property is a 2.5 to 3m stone fence, I have purchased a random stone roller to make them, stay tuned

Cheers

Matt

DDay Normandy 2019

This year we had Canadian guests for DDay tours from the 4th to the 8th of June. On the fifth on June we attended the commemorations at Carentan and Sainte Mère Église. We elected to visit both camp Arizona at Carentan and Geronimo at Sainte Mère Église, plus the museum.
The crowds were big as expected, but we entered Carentan from the south west so we could park at the stock yards, and have a short walk to the events. At Sainte Mère Église we managed to get a car park  near the tourist info centre, 40m from the church!

Qq