Going Forth with Mimi and Tou Tou

The dust jacket is a little ‘tired’ but the book itself is in really good condition - I can forgive the wear and tear for the sum of £3.29!

 When it comes to looking for one of the more bizarre episodes of the Great War, or indeed any war for that matter, then the Royal Navy expedition to Lake Tanganyika must surely take pole position!

I am aware of the story and indeed, have owned the above book previously - it is one of a number that mysteriously vanished during one of my various ‘reorgansations’ - so when the opportunity to avail myself of a new copy for next to nothing I promptly did so - and it arrived this morning.

From the indefatigable Mr David Manley (available from the Wargames Vault) and….

….the ever prolific Bob Cordery (available from Amazon and Lulu - the book that is, not Bob himself….)!

The battle and campaign have featured in various wargaming publications but the two I am most concerned with are Bob Cordery’s Gridded Naval Wargames and David Manley’s Steamer Wars. The former has a novel set of tactical rules  whilst the latter also covers the whole campaign for control of the lake. There are models available from Tumbling Dice in 1:600th and also from a New Zealand firm (I can’t remember the name off the top of my head) but for a miserly old skinflint like myself they would certainly be easy enough to scratch build (and I know that Bob Cordery did just that!).

David Manley’ collection featuring some commercially available types as well a few conversions. It all looks pretty straightforward to my stylised building technique eyes!

It would be really easy to tackle this as a mini project with a view to using the campaign rules from David Manley’s set and either his tactical rules or those from Bob. Certainly something to think about and a little different for sure.

In other news….

It has been a pretty wretched week as SWMBO, my daughter and I have all succumbed to a bout of a summer cold. It all started at the beginning of the week with scratch eyes, a tickle in the throat and then came the streaming nose. I am no expert on these things but I reckon having our second Covid jab on Tuesday actually accelerated the process so by Wednesday my wife and I were feeling pretty grim (at this stage my daughter was not quite as bad), so much so that on Thursday we took the precaution of taking a Covid test which was happily negative. Aside from the above there was also the feeling hot and cold and having a head that felt as though it was full of cotton wool. 

This was only ever going to end one way and sure enough we all now have horrible hacking chesty coughs.

It is nothing more serious though - which is a relief!