jfbat

Yep, saw it in a BR in Denmark too this summer. It was discounted too, would cost about 33 euro (converted from kroner). Was very tempted, but in the end decided that 1 was enough. Silly me. Regret that choice now, the bus alone would have been worth it...

Airfix is mainly a UK thing, though they have been available for quite some time now in the Netherlands (if I remeber correctly the local store in my home town carried the boxed kits when I was a kid, that was in the eighties!). They have never been that big on the continent. I have been an avid model builder too, found Hasegawa to be the best make for kits, these days it's Hobby and Academy that have taken ofer that baton I think. Stopped building them in the early nineties though, tried one a few years ago but found the painting too much of a hassle... Easy kits have been on the market for quite some time now. Aimed mostly I think at kids that are nog yet ready for the real thing. I have found them mostly disappointing, fitting was always a problem and paintschemes did almost never align well. These Airfix kits seem to be quite ok, maybe I will try one is available over here (one of the shops I sometimes visit carries Arifix). Bit weird though that they went for such a direct copy of Lego, maybe it's also testing the waters for a line of more lego-like kits.

It was available at Billund last week though, so maybe you're lucky. ;) I got my GE today btw. One-third into the build by now.

Ah, okay, the prices should be better there! Happy shopping!

Be aware that the store at Legoland Billund is big, but also has the rather high (for European standards) Denmark prices for lego. I was there last week and went away empty-handed, knowing that I could buy all sets for (sometimes considerably) less in my homecountry. The big advantage is that they caryy almost all of the current sets (the BTTF and special edition Technic crawler sets being the exemptions).

To be honest I think the seller is getting off the hook a little bit easy this way. Lego boxes are made from relatively thin cardboard, which makes it quite obvious that they cannot be mailed with only some thin layer of protection around it. It was his/her risk that the box and its contents could be damaged by mailing it this way. Though the real value is in the box, at the price you paid you could at least expect the box to arrive complete and without damages. Merely restituting the mailing costs feels just a bit too easy.

Love the idea, but would be really worried one of the trains might fall off in time...

I have to say that most Dutch people also mostly associate UniLever with cleaning products, I think most people would be surprised to know that most of the (processed) food they buy at their supermarket is also a UniLiver product. When however you do pay attention to the small logos on packaging, the UniLever logo almost seems omnipresent in these here neck of the woods... ;) Loved reading about these sets. They're from my youth, but somehow my parents apparently found a way to keep these from me, as I don't remember them...

Love the classic space computers in the control room. Underground radar? Nice one!

Yup. It was on my to-buy list (if it were te be released) because the new set is a bit over the top for me (the crane is just too much). So I really hope it will be re-released for those of you who don't have it yet, it's a nice set. Or maybe you could be as lucky as I was... It was a lucky Lego-day for me anyway, got 60016 at just under 75% of the listprice too. This one I got at a drugstore (Kruidvat) which has the same discount for most of the vehicle sets from this year as far as I could see, so a nice tip for my fellow dutch guys 'n gals (and visitors) that want one of those.

I got the last one (and as I said: it was an overstock box of the old set - not the re-release!), so there's no use going there... But there are some advantages to living in a more rural part of the Netherlands (in this case the lovely town of Putten (Gelderland)), you get lucky shots like this one once in a while. I have had some before, shops in smaller towns that want to sell of inventory, which means you sometimes are able to pick up sets for considerable less than the original price...

So, I went into a local shop today and what did I spot? Hold your horses though... it was an overstock 7641. Which I bought for a very nice price (less than the new one is rumoured to cost).

What a beautiful model... It just shows that with Lego you really can make everything (harking back to that old slogan they used in our country). Also some very nice techniques and to be honest: worth every cent they ask for it. But... not for me. I wouldn't know where to put it (though I have a feeling this is one of those sets my girlfriend wouldn't mind having in the living room) and it is way beyond what I am willing to pay for a Lego set. Even one as beautiful as this.

My "dark ages" started somewhere around the time I got into playing guitar - big time. I must have been around 17-18. I got back into Lego when I bought the first version of the Sopwith Camel - the brown one. It was so unbelievably cheap when I spotted it in a toy store that I just couldn't not buy it. When I came home at night, I built it in record time and was hooked again... That was when I was 28. So my dark ages lasted about 10 years.

The Coast Guard sets have also appeared in stores in the Netherlands, but I wasn't looking for them. After searching a bit, shuffling boxes around etcetera I found what i wás looking for: 60023 City Starter Set. It was hidden from view, behind some other boxes, so maybe it wasn't supposed to be on sale yet, but the cash register didn't protest, so it's the first summer set I got.

This takes me back... I've had quite a view of these sets when I was a kid. Loved them to bits - literally sometimes! I also recognize quite a few of the problems you encountered with the parts. As I remember it the logos on the bricks sometimes faded quite quickly and sometimes even weren't that good when they came fresh out of the box. The cracked helmets were a frequent problem, the tailsections and supports breaking/bending were a familiair problem too. I also remember having one of those minifigs with a stickered torso, and also that it dissapointed me a bit, even back then. Great to see them restored to their original greatness. I think these sets would still make popular sets today.