Fort Liezele

The village where I live is also the site of the best-kept armoured fort that once formed part of the National Redoubt  around Antwerp. "Fort Liezele" as it is known, recently got a complete overhaul. It is of course a military heritage site, but also has a lot of other functions.

Part of the renovation was upgrading the current museum inside the fort. The museum focuses on the building of the fort during the pre-WW1 period, but also on the outbreak of the war and the role of the forts before WW1 got bogged down in trench warfare. Fort Liezele was not realy invovled in the fighting - the German breakthrough towards Antwerp happened in another sector of the defensive perimeter around Antwerp. It's also the reason why Fort Liezele barely received any damage (and also, only 1 soldier died during August 1014 in the Fort before the Fort surrendered).

I'm also completing my training as a guide to the museum and the Fort. When there was a call last year for new guides, I of course volunteered.

But anyway, here are some pictures of the renewed museum. I restrict them to only the uniforms, for the other things, you might have to come and visit yourself ;-)

The end of an era ...

I didn't renew my subscription for Miniature Wargames this month.

I have been subscribed to Miniature Wargames ever since Henry Hyde took over as editor (and when Battlegames was folded in Miniature Wargames), back in 2013. I also have an almost complete collection of all issues since issue 1 (see also the Wargames Magazine Index).

But during the last year, my print magazines failed to arrive every month. Granted, the helpful people at the publisher's subscription services send me a replacement copy every time I asked for one, but this situation couldn't go on. It makes no sense to pay for a magazine that doesn't end up in your mailbox.

"What about a digital subscription?" Sure, but I like having a paper magazine in my mailbox and in hand, to sit down and read it. I know from personal experience I rarely read pdf magazines - they just pile up in unread digital archives. I spend most of my working day in front of computer screens, so I don't want to spend my evenings staring at screens as well.

I don't know why the magazine doesn't arrive in my mailbox. It could be anything, perhaps my local postman is snatching them up (maybe a wargamer?). Perhaps cross-channel mail has become unreliable since Brexit (that's one of the explanations the publisher gave me)? Who knows? But the end result is I'm not getting my magazines...

If due to Brexit, it's really ravaging my hobby. My magazines don't arrive anymore, all sorts of trouble with orders from the UK (basically stopped ordering from the UK, unless there's no other option), and two major conventions I used to attend and run games for stopped operating (not only due to Brexit, but it was a contributing factor).

So I guess I'll start collecting back issues from all sorts of 2nd hand sales from now on. Luckily, there's always WSS, for which I still have a subscription :-)