The White Castle

 For my birthday recently my son gave a copy of The White Castle, a boardgame which came out last year from Devir (BBG  link).  It's a very pretty game set around Himeji castle where each player is trying to build influence over the course of 3 turns.

Visually it's great with a very pretty board and a range of meeples in the shape af courtiers, gardeners and warriors, as well as some Cranes (the birds, not the building site things) and a rather OTT turn marker in the shape of a Carp.

It's a very Euro style game where you spend the available dice (which sit on some lovely little bridges) to place meeples and, if you've worked out your strategy right, this triggers a number of subsequent actions.  Your meeples can tend the gardens, visit the castle well, courtiers can make their way though the 3 levels of the castle or  warriors can train in the yard.  All of which trigger different subsequent actions.  

If, like my son, you're good at stringing these together and have built your action engine cleverly, the points and resources quickly start to mount up.  If, like me, you've randomly placed things because it seemed like a good idea at the time it may not work so well!  Actually I was ahead for most of the game but he ran away with it in the end of game scoring phase.

It's a neat little game... visually it's great, the mechanics are actually pretty simple and everything is explained by icons on the board itself, and it has a relatively short playing time.  You can only do 1 action per round and there are 3 turns of 6 rounds each, so choices are limited and require some careful thinking. Recommended!

I have been to... Alfriston and the South Downs

 It was my birthday a couple of weeks ago (feeling old now!) and my main birthday pressie was a mystery trip away somewhere.  My wife and I used to do this a lot, especially when we lived in a small flat, but we hadn't been away for ages so I'd left it to her to plan a trip somewhere, sometime.  She decided not to wait till the spring but to take a chance on a decent couple of days in late November and so I was whisked away for a couple of nights.

We didn't actually go that far... just over an hours drive to East Sussex... but it's not a part of the country we know that well.  Bizarrely, neighbouring West Sussex is really familiar as, until last year, that was part of my patch for work but I rarely crossed the invisible line into the far East.  After a stop off for lunch and a dog walk at Sheffield Park we ended up in the lovely village of Alfriston in the South Downs, staying in the 14thC pub The George Inn (highly recommended for the accommodation , food and beer!).  Alfriston is a lovely little village, home to the 1st property acquired by the National Trust at the end of the 19thC, the medieval Clergy House

I also loved the fact that, where some towns commemorate battles and rebellions, Alfriston thought it important to highlight a 'fracas' with a plaque... things may even have got a bit tetchy...

They also had one of those Sea Mine collecting boxes, again commemorating something that might have happened, but didn't...

It did make me think of Hot Fuzz!

Mostly we spent a lovely long weekend walking the dogs on bits of the South Downs and stopping off for coffee and cake... can I squeeze in anything historical/wargamey??  Well of course...

Elaine knows me too well so had chosen a spot with some historical attractions as well as nice food and walks.  First stop was Pevensey Castle 

Warden of the Cinque Ports to Pevensey with 2 ships...

Part of the outer Roman wall

A tudor cannon (the frame is a replica)

Pevensey first saw life as a Roman fort, part of the Saxon Shore defences, although there's a theory that they may have actually been built to reduce Rome's influence on Britain rather than the raiding tribes from Europe.  It was rebuilt by the Normans and then saw continuous use through to the 16th century including assorted sieges and high ranking prisoners.  William I's army sheltered in the remnants of the original fort after landing at Pevensey in 1066.

We also passed by the nearby Long Man of Wilmington although we didn't get a chance to stop and have a decent explore.  This chalk carving dates back to Neolithic/Iron Age/17th century CE depending on who you believe.

Cuckmere Haven 

Our final historical link is at Cuckmere Haven... a lovely walk along the edge of saltmarshes in a gap in the Seven Sisters... a range of chalky hills along the coast.  Since most of this stretch of coast consists of cliffs, a nice flat gap was a tempting possible landing site during WW2 so there are a range of defences across the gap including several pill boxes, ditches and Dragons Teeth anti tank defences.  

It makes sense to defend the gap but I imagine it would have been a very narrow bottleneck for any invaders and pretty marshy as well.  For anyone who's interested in this kind of thing, this is a type 25 Pillbox (lots more info on pillboxes here).  This one is quite a way back from the coast... there are a couple more guarding the beach but this one seems to be a 2nd line of defence.  It was a steep slippery slope up to it and I nearly broke my neck sliding around in the chalky mud (much to Elaine's amusement!).  She's quite worried that I'm turning into a Pillbox spotter!!

If you're down on the coast I can recommend Alfriston as a lovely base to stay in.  And lastly here are a couple photos of the dogs enjoying the break and guarding the South coast from invaders (although I suspect they'd betray us for a sausage...)