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| Me and Rifleman Harris |
He was a celebrity guest at Military Odyssey, the three-day living history event that Rachel and I dropped in on today.
Mr Salkey was such a pleasant and unassuming chap, so nice, friendly and easy to talk to. I wish I'd engaged him in conversation longer actually as afterwards I thought of a million questions I should have asked him.
He did sign a nice big picture of Harris, Sharpe (Sean Bean), Harper and Hagman - from the Sharpe's Regiment story - that will eventually get framed and take pride of place in the gamesroom stairwell.
The world's largest multi-period re-enactment show, Military Odyssey - unlike the other big events we go to - doesn't focus on one particular period of history, so as we made our way across the grounds, we travelled through time from Ancient Britain and the Roman Empire, through to the French-Indian War and the American Civil War up to the Second World War. We even saw a lone pirate, with his family, doing then rounds.
This was the first time we'd hired me a scooter for this event and it certainly helped. I still hadn't recovered from all the walking we did on Saturday and then again yesterday when there was a slight "incident" with the car keys getting locked in the boot of the car while we were getting a replacement brake light... and Rachel and I ended up walking home to get the spareset of keys (I then stayed at home, I must admit).
There was plenty to tempt the wallet at Military Odyssey - both authentic for collectors and reproduction for the re-enactors - but, thankfully, nothing that fell completely within my ever-narrowing focus (that I could justify purchasing - with Rachel's money - that is).
In the Indoor Collectors Market, there were a couple of tables of Warhammer displays, but otherwise most of the wargames stuff there (and there wasn't much really) was Second World War.
We watched a couple of brilliantly brutal fighting displays (Vikings vs Saxons and Crusaders vs Saracens) as well as the big American Civil War re-enactment on the main battleground, before it started to rain - signalling our time to retreat to the safety of the car.
As always there were plenty of photographs taken and they can be found over at public Facebook album.
Nice picture, and sounds like a good time was had!
ReplyDeleteHiring the scooter was a wise move, I think it's important to embrace our geekdom on our own terms!
Thanks, Paul. This and War & Peace aren't really practical for me on foot these days.
DeleteUnfortunately I don't think a scooter would work at the Herstmonceux Medieval Festival though - lot of gradients, off-roading and no real pathways away from the castle.
Rachel says I'm not allowed a scooter for "real life" (such as pootling up Tonbridge High Street) though as I'd just get lazy(-er) and fat (-ter)!
It was Sharpe's Rifles that got me into re-enactment! I wish I still had the money to keep it up, as i had a great time in the 33rd Yorkshire regiment of foot. I've got a lot of mates who still attend, and I'm constantly jealous of the places they get to go...
ReplyDeleteAfter spending a day watching these people I can totally see the attraction of the hobby - but it also became clear that it has to be your MAIN hobby as clearly there's some serious investment involved!
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