african animals (3) ....

some quick repaints of the last of the accumulated plastic animals....

some hippos

 spotted hyenas

 I had a selection of large gazelle-like ones, decided to paint these as oryx ...

Passing through India ....

Crichton Odd and his fiance Hermione Fellowes on their way back from Burma have stopped off in India to visit some temples,  including this deserted one ....

expedition to Burma ...

Crichton Odd accompanied by his fiance Hermione Fellowes and a detachment of Indian troops are investigating and mapping the positions of ruins in the jungles of Burma.

They have sailed up river in the gunboat Aurora, and setup a base camp  ..... sailors from the gunboat have joined the mapping expedition to provide an additional escort.

---oXo---

Odd and his party have been in the jungle for a couple of days, the men at the base camp wait for their return...

Odd gets the position of the monument they are on top of and puts in in his notebook; an officer comes up to tell them that the rest of the men are ready to move on ...

The party sets off through the jungle led by a native guide ....

they cross the bridge with out incident ...

and continue onwards towards through a temple ruin

just as Odd has recorded the position of the temple a group of natives attacks ...

a few shots from the sailors and the natives melt away into the jungle ...

as they make their way along they proceed cautiously ....

a couple of rhinos wander out of the undergrowth but seem uninterested in the sailors who are watching them carefully, one fires a shot in the air but the the rhinos are unperturbed and carry on grazing ...

as they move past the long grass towards a rise they are attacked by a large group of natives ....

meanwhile the camp by the river is under attack ...

they fire at the approaching natives, the gun on the Aurora is turned on the attackers

many of the natives are killed and they fall back into the jungle ...

the fight still continues in the jungle  ....

one native makes off with one of the mules carrying supplies,  while Odd and some sailors fight off the rest

 after seeing off the attack the party is glad to get back to the camp by the river ......

they decide to strike camp and get on the gunboat, moving downstream towards the nearest town; overall the mapping expedition was a success with many sites of interest recorded for future investigation.

checking supplies....

von Tiddenheim has gone down to a warehouse in the industrial area of Wittenberg to check on the build-up of supplies for the upcoming expedition to the south seas...

 he is pleased to see that most of what he requires is ready ...

when the rest has been obtained, all will be moved via rail to a port ....

african animals (2) ....

more plastic animals based up ....

some large gorillas ..

a selection of zebras...

some wildebeest (repainted these)...

african animals...

been slowly working my way through my box of accumulated animals....

a selection of painted elephants, including the rather nice one from Steve Barber miniatures; rest are plastic ones

 some plastic giraffes,

 two plastic rhinos, repainted

A meeting of the Geographical and Historical society ....

Von Tiddenheim made his way to the local branch of the Geographical and Historical society in Wittenberg, for a meeting ...

the meeting showed slides of the early 1900's Krugiel expedition to the far east and south seas, the attendees were very interested in what they showed, some of the slides ...

 after the slide show, attendees looked over maps and entered into lively discussions,

Von Tiddenheim proposed an expedition to explore and investigate some of the sites discovered by the Krugiel expedition - which was approved - there would be much planning to do before they could leave ...............

Civilians and Character figures ....

Finally finished painting some civilian and character figures (shown here) for use in games and story lines (some will also find their way into ww2 as well)

some plastic figures produced by Lledo to go with their Days Gone By range...

and some metal Cluedo figures ...

African animals - WIP

I've slowly collecting up animals for Africa, mostly sourced from plastic toys. ...

I cut some 'top of heads' off the plastic hippos to be used to represent them in the water.  I've also got a small selection of animals for other regions - will be building these up as I find items.

Wittenberg Rifle volunteers ...

Von Tiddenheim is back in the Yucatan, 

this time on a small expedition, with him is a small military support force - volunteers from the Wittenberg rifles kitted out for overseas duties

Steam River Launch

Von Tiddenheim takes a little trip on a steam river launch ...

'Multi-ship'completed - optional configurations

Finished off the steering house etc and decided on a colour scheme for the ships and deck options. A black hull, faded brown deck and the rest grey.

Passenger ship or private yacht ....

 a small cargo vessel

 gunboat ...

Ship - multiple deck options - WIP

I've been working on the hull and kit parts shown in a previous post , the hull has been given a deck and initial superstructure with space in the deck for alternate sections to swap fore and aft.

sections made so far: fore gun; aft cabin section, cargo hatch, gun

deck sections, provide lots of variation, the private yacht or small passenger ship

 a small cargo ship

 a gunboat ...

the tricky thing will be a paint scheme that will work for all variants. I will finish the superstructure and cabin section first.

Across the desert sands ....

At Sidi al Byriani,  a watch is kept on the desert from the small military outpost - Crichton Odd's survey expedition was due here two days ago..

---oXo---

The expedition had been dogged by bad luck; the first truck had broken an axle on some rocky ground and the big end had blown out on the second truck when they were a day out from Sidi al Byriani; so they gathered up their essentials and continued on foot .... their first stop would be a small oasis ..

They were glad to come in sight of the the Oasis .....

with the oasis secured, men took it in turns to refill their water bottles and have a rest...

 after a short while they left the oasis and headed towards some nearby ruins ....

 as they approached the nearby ruins, they could see a couple of men with a small lorry there, perhaps they could get some help ?

but NO ! they were treasure hunters, up they popped from the ruins guns blazing ....

but soon they found out that they were outmatched ..

and jumped into their van and drove off into the desert .......

while the party had a rest Crichton Odd got his bearings from atop of the remains of a small temple ...

off they went again and neared a small rock field...

the party picked their way through the rocks ....

out of nowhere a small pride of desert lions appeared ....

the nearby men fired at them, killing one but enraging the others who went on the rampage mauling anyone they could reach ....

finally the lions rampage was over, with two of them dead and the other one skulking away....

 the remnants of the little column reformed on the other side of the rock field and trudged across the desert without further incident reaching Sidi al Byriani