ATA memorial

Very little is left of Hamble airfield, other than an information board. 

The airfield had an important role WWII as a repair base for Spitfires and one of the ferry pools for the Air Transport Auxillary. Pilots in the ATA, many of them women, flew aircraft (including Spitfires, Hurricanes and even Lancasters) from factories or repair sites to the RAF airfields and so (re)join their allocated squadron. 

So it's fitting that, next to the information board, there is a memorial to the ATA pilots.

And look what the next side road is called ...

Anyone interested in the ATA, and especially their women pilots, should consider getting a copy of this book:

Spitfire jigsaw

Got this Spitfire jigsaw puzzle for my birthday from dear friends (you know who you are!).

As always when we do a jigsaw, we do the edge first, ...

... and then lay out all the remaining pieces.

If the jigsaw has some sky, that's often done last, but I decided to keep the Spits for last, and do the blue sky first.

Sky done, sea next!

Sea done, clouds next! 

Clouds done! And with sky, sea and clouds done, what's left is the 'meat' of the jigsaw: the Spitfire squadron itself. 

They're coming along nicely!

 Final piece in its place: jigsaw done!

Was a fun one to do, but sky and sea were a real challenge. Not only because there isn't much pattern or colour to go on in these areas, but also because all the pieces were standard jigsaw pieces, with two 'innies' and two 'outies', so piece shape was not much of a help.

Thank you again, my friends!

D-Day Spitfire

D-Day changed the direction of WW II, and I wanted to have a model of a Spitfire that flew in that operation. Not difficult with eBay under your fingertips!

The model has invasion stripes, and here is a picture of the actual aircraft before it got its stripes:

it is still flying today, as far as I'm aware!

As I've done a few times before, I decided to add a couple more models: an RAF Hawker Typhoon and two USAAF aircraft: P-51 Mustang and P-47 Thunderbolt (I'm aware that these models don't sport the Invasion stripes, but couldn't find any that did, apart from the Spit).

Just a single Luftwaffe aircraft, to illustrate that the Luftwaffe wasn't able to mount much of a resistance in the air during D-Day: a Focke-Wulf 190.

Here are all five fighter planes together: