Brrrrrr….. It got to 3:30pm, and I took one look at my beer fridge and another look out the window – I wasn’t sure which was colder. The beer was tempting, but some exercise first right? I changed and headed to the car – wtf? The moment I stepped out the front door, I was regretting my decision. Bitterly cold, gusting winds – was this UK??? I had hardly driven around the corner when I needed to switch on the windscreen wipers… It’s January in Thailand ffs, not England!
Horny was the hare, at one of his favourite spots in Maerim – he loves setting runs when he’s trapped between the river and the golf course, so I had the route mapped out in my head before I got out the car. He was stood shivering in a rain jacket. What was I doing there?
The songthaew arrived and a gaggle of hashers started huddling together. Horny called 5 minutes to harebrief, meh… we wanted to get moving, warm up and get it over with. Finally we could set off and immediately headed into a construction yard. Even Graven and Chuckie set off at a run as we all tried to warm up – I still can’t believe how cold it is! First check was straight along the bank of the small river heading towards the Ping River. Another circle, and it had to be to the left. Piggy got to the obvious spot first, and turned back leaving the other FRBs having to head over to the river. As they ran off, I said to Piggy, “are you sure?”. “I guess I could look a bit more he said and ambled slowly back that way while Graven lead the rest of the pack in completely the wrong direction. Sure enough, after giving it enough time for them to warm up, Piggy called us on from exactly where we all wanted to go.
Then it was shiggy time. Not your average shiggy, this was the deep dense shiggy that no one in their right mind would try to hack a trail through. We know Horny isn’t in his right mind though, some how he’d ploughed through – no wonder his co-hare didn’t dare show up. We hacked our way along the side of the river, and then a circle check across the bridge. Tricky one Horny… I checked a couple of different directions, while the rest of the pack scattered. I was cold though, and it was raining, that bitterly cold UK rain. I headed along the road, and intercepted trail with the pack behind me (is that the definition of short cutting?)
Around the corner and an old favourite circle check by the temple – well, he would’t want to put paper down through the temple, so I respectfully jogged past some bemused monks to find trail heading into the rice field. There is a bridge along here, I knew that, but when I got to the inevitable circle, I took the time to check other options, and only as Brownie approached from behind did I go to crawl my way across the bridge – damn I hate those bamboo balance bridges. Sure enough I was on the other side, and when I hit another circle it was time to head in. Cold, cold, cold as fuck. I’m wearing 3 pairs of socks now, and my feet still feel cold.