A weekend with the Browning 825

In the run up to Christmas I was packed off to Le Domaine de Sandricourt: one of Frances premier shooting estates, to celebrate the launch of the B825, Browning’s latest shotgun with a few days of electrifying sport.

The Browning team had instructed us to meet at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport by 1030 which meant a fiendishly early start. At home in Sussex I had set my alarm for a time that started with a two, which no matter the adventure that awaits, always feels fairly grim. After the promise of excessive future reparations, my long suffering girlfriend agreed to drive our car back from Heathrow if I drove us there which saved me from the ghoulish nightmare of morning trains or a night in an airport Premier Inn. She slumbered in the fully reclined passenger seat while I blearily navigated the deserted country lanes in the inky winter darkness. Despite Slade screaming “IT’S CHRISTMAS” from the radio, I did not yet feel especially festive.

The Browning team had outdone themselves. The Chateux de Sandricourt was utterly stunning. The traditional French mansion with it’s external shutters and wonderful symmetry could have been straight from a Disney film. The house was set amongst acres of manicured lawns, punctuated with geometric formal gardens, classical statues, and avenues of trees that drew your eye up to the horizon. We had a wonderful welcoming party consisting of the house staff and dapper estate manager, Thibaut Constant.

I was shown to my gargantuan room which featured a roll top bath and views out over the endless box hedges and ochre woods. I dumped my bags and spun back down the stone spiral staircase for the scheduled lunch. The rest of the house was stunning. A long anteroom with a snooker table and crackling fire led us through to a the dining room where faded ancestral portraits gazed at us from the walls. The house was built in the early 19th century by the Marquis de Beavoir but was sold to an American family of note called the Goelet’s in 1908. Although the staff told us that the chateaux had been used by Hitler’s right hand man Herman Goring as his headquarters for part of the war, it has remained in the possession of the Goelet family who still visit several times a year but rent it out to hunting parties in between.

Lunch was decadence incarnate. Scallops as an amuse bouche, followed by foie gras to start, and then fillet steak, panna cotta and cheese. Following this bacchanalian feast I felt like a good sleep, but nap time had not been included on the itinerary. The Browning team gave us strict instructions to be back down suited and booted in 15 minutes for what would be our first chance to set eyes on the magnificent weapons we had woken up so early to try. With a combination of excitement and indigestion I scampered back to my room to change and presently met the rest of the group outside.

Although very warm, the stiff suspension and high centre of gravity of the gun bus gave the occupants the impression of being at sea in a gale, so I was perfectly ready to disembark once we had arrived at the young beech wood at which were to shoot. We lined out along the ten or so pegs and as luck had it I was at the furthest point away on the end. We loaded up and the simulated drive began. High clays began to fly out at a ferocious rate. My neighbour was an energetic and smiley Italian journalist with whom I had had a few prior jolly conversations. Every time I raised my gun to fire at a clay it was powdered before my eyes. A couple of times I laughed demonstratively and looked across as I thought he was doing it humorously. No eye contact was made and I realised that in Europe you must have your wits about you if you wish to get any good shooting.

For half an hour or so the barrage of clays continued. I became rather swifter at locking on to them and had plenty of chance to become acquainted with the gun. I had selected the Sporter for the occasion, and even though my shooting is anything but polished, we began to work well together. I fired close to a hundred shots over the session and was feeling pretty confident by the end, even impishly smoking one or two of the clays that came over my Italian neighbour. I rarely fire so many shots in such a short time and gently pressed my shoulder once the end of the drive had been called. There was no bruising, stiffness or discomfort, a testament to the gun. As I was taught as a boy I still pop two fingers down the barrels after an unload to make sure I haven’t left a shell in there. In this case I absent mindedly carried out my usual ritual and promptly burnt the tips of my index and middle fingers on the barrels due to frenetic intensity of the shooting.

By the time we finished, the temperature was dropping, the light was golden and the sun was casting long shadows. As the bus wallowed its way back to the house everyone was babbling excitedly about how much they had appreciated the new gun, comparing experiences and results. A wonderfully thoughtful way for the Browning team to introduce us to their new offering and a great way to get us all comfortable with it in a low pressure environment.

On our return we had a quick cup of tea and were then rushed into the warm library for a detailed presentation from product and sales manager Lionel Neuville to talk us through the new and legacy design features of the B825. With all the early starts and an afternoon out in the cold there were a few glassy eyes around the room. Once or twice the Browning execs did have to nudge a chair or two to make sure the whole party of assembled writers were fully awake. Lionel, told us that the B725 will slowly be phased out and that the B825 is going to be priced as a slightly smarter gun to distance it from the 525. While the 825 will retail at a higher price we were assured that the margin would be exactly the same as its predecessor.

Once the presentation was over we retired to ready ourselves for supper. My beautiful enamel bath was the size of a Rotterdam dry dock and when after 20 minutes of filling the hot water ran out, leaving it just six inches deep. I decided to cut my losses and had a brief thrash in the shallow luke warm water which left me sufficiently cleansed. The delicious meals began to blur a little but our evening feed consisted of some combination of lobster, seabass, wild boar and venison washed down with a good deal of fortifying French wine. After much convivial conversation, most of us retired early for what promised to be a stellar next day.

I awoke in the pale blue light that precedes sunrise. The gardens hung heavy with the nights frost and my telephone told me that the temperature was still a few below. A quick continental breakfast with a flagon of reviving black coffee and it was time to meet our loaders. I have never had a designated loader before and never double gunned, so this was certain to be a memorable experience. Much to our surprise and delight the night before, estate manager Thibaut had said that todays shoot would be almost entirely grey partridge shot from butts and the experience would be similar to driven grouse shooting.

On le premier batue the butts faced an enormous striated game strip that went back around a kilometre. Stephen explained that the game strips consisted of a line of maize, then a line of sorghum, a line of canary grass, then a closely cropped stripe of regular grass to allow the grey partridge chicks to get around, and then a final strip that was drilled with a wild meadow mix. Decked out in dayglow orange, the beaters advanced along the strip in the usual way. For the first drive I was on the end.

We hadn’t been waiting long when a great covey of greys lifted and following the contours of the undulating field, rocketed towards us. The birds were barely a few feet from the ground and travelling at enormous speed. I didn’t raise my gun and then received a barrage of encouragement from Didier to do so. I fired both barrels and missed. Didier and I exchanged guns and he violently gestured that I should have a go at them behind me as well. I did so and succeeded in shooting my first ever grey partridge. Although Stephen had explained that we were allowed to shoot low in front until the horn was blown from when on we were only allowed to shoot behind, this precise format had taken me a little by surprise and it felt like I was ignoring all the lessons of my younger shooting life. With high arc markers on each side of the butt it was impossible to swing through the line and once the horn went it was only blue sky or behind so in reality it was all perfectly safe.

Grey partridge are extremely skittish I learned and they almost always flew in coveys of 50 or more. Stephen said the team spent a huge amount of time dogging in as the birds tend to wander. Having shot my first grey I was over the moon and the day continued to get better. The drives would quite often be driven one way and then the beaters would get round the back of the Guns and drive them back over you so you were often in each butt for an hour or so. Over the course of the next few drives I understood the flight of the birds a little better and began connecting. During a particularly purple patch I got a left and a right of greys and then later on a grey and a red leg. I was quietly chuffed about this but my confidence rocketed when Didier shouted “Bravo, le doublay” as he brandished Churchill’s V sign at me smiling.

The next day which was primarily pheasant was another fabulous if more conventional outing, and with even more birds to go at, I became exceptionally comfortable with the B825. On one drive I managed four left and rights something I have never achieved before and this time received a double thumbs up from the avuncular and smiling Didier. For one drive I was walking gun, a position I love and was able to snaffle a few crossers peeling out of the side. On the third drive I was ensconced in an icy wood and thus able to indulge in some thrilling snapshooting. On the second drive where we were stationed in the trough of a steep valley, the the pheasants were among the highest I have seen and yet still the line of Browning wielding journalists continued to haul them down. On one of the middle drives an outlandishly high lone pheasant flew out over the well known shooting coach Mike Yardley. With all eyes on him he folded this 65 yarder and we all watched for what felt like an epoch as it tumbled to earth. He couldn’t quite suppress a pleased smile as we congratulated him on it afterwards.

The third evening brought more food, more good company an in the morning we were deposited back at the airport. Waiting for my plane I promised myself I would eat nothing but salad for the following week as I was feeling a bit scorbutic. The gun was an absolute peach and had served me well. The event had felt like an Erasmus for hunters and couldn’t have been better planned to show us the versatility of the two new models. The Browning team were hugely knowledgeable and the passion with which they have produced their latest release was apparent in every swing and every shot.