Only another month or so until we get a new beer monster! 😀 This one didn’t have electrolyte, causing a few grumpy faces before the harebrief. It seemed Piggy had a bit more to say in the harebrief, but gave up and set us off.. Soon enough there was a circle – a bit confusing as the circle was back on trail behind where the trail finished. I got it right and headed towards the hills with Alice in quick pursuit. The trail peeled off to the left to a lemming cliff jump. I paused for a while wondering if we really were supposed to jump off the edge, before turning around to see who was following me – when I did, I spotted the false trail on the back of the tree. Phew, I headed back to the main trail and the pack followed me up the hill.
The next check is where things got messy. Clearly someone had tampered with the trail. Clearly paper had been torn off, and clearly some checks were no longer there. We got stuck at a circle check that took a long, long time to find, mostly because the trail had been taken away. Finally we did some forensic analysis of staples that appeared to have recently been stuck into a tree, and pieced the fuck up together. There were probably 3-4 checks missing, with random papers in between. Tough to follow, which resulted in the pack being kept together. Square Rooter was leading the way for a while, and I remember seeing Stumbling Dyke running along ahead of me at one point. Despite the confusion, it created a nice hasher community spirit and together we solved the problem!
The trail had been clinging to the edge of the hills, and finally it headed towards the hills. I got a circle right, and then a V-check wrong, which put me along with Chuckie who was mumbling about his lack of fitness, still being sick and all.. I got to a circle check with Knock Out and she gave me the choice of where to check. I picked straight… until I spotted something up the hill to the left – changed my mind and everyone followed. We had some climbing to do and no avoiding it. It seemed tough at the time, but it wasn’t so bad – a bit of off trail scramble, and soon enough we were back on the ridge trails, trying to guess how far back we needed to go before we could drop down the hill.
Another V-Check, and Chuckie really wanted me to check to the right, but no chance, I am going left! And then a circle, and a random Alice appeared from nowhere! I will be interested to see his strava to find out how he got there ahead of us – for sure it wasn’t all on trail, but from talking after I think he only skipped a little corner, but given we didn’t hear anything from him, perhaps he’s spent too long at the Turkish school of hashing? Snowballs was hot on my tail, and given the chance he took over the lead, a lead he wasn’t going to give up! Now I was 2nd, or 3rd to checks, so started having to take the lower percentages, and lost some ground – Alice passed, KO passed, Sloppy passed, Graven passed…
But we were descending, and we were running. Breezing through a few checks, and ahead there was a circle. Alice down the hill checking when it was called to the right just before I got there – he didn’t come back! I was running with KO, with Sloppy just ahead peeling the checks as he followed I guess Snowballs as he was just out of sight. Suddenly it seemed like KO sped up and was pounding down the hill behind me! I pushed on a bit, in my macho mood not wanting KO to catch me. Surely I could hold her off??! Another couple of hundred meters and I was seriously wondering what had got into her – surely she doesn’t push this much??? A glance over my shoulder as she caught me, and I realised it was Graven Image catching up from going wrong at one of the last circles!
We cruised past the ONIN and into the A-site to find Alice debriefing the hare and Sups had outwitted us all again!
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Courtesy Alice:-
My area of hills, writes humble scribe Alice, thus I was intrigued, what would the porcine duo have in store for us?
At the first circle Byte chose correctly up, so I followed. You can’t go thru the back of the Grand Canyon! A slightly silly off trail left, overpapered, had to be a FT but did it go into the hills by a secret path. Not. FT. But you never know!
At the next obvious check its on up into the doi or down the dip and round. Alas KO didn’t go far enough to find paper so we rechecked, headed bush to find non existent trails before finally just going further along the obvious path. On on!
A missing check at the next corner…..confusion…perhaps a circle missing and no paper. I checked confidently up to the doi then heard Byte yell OnOn from the loop.
Jogged around that loop and more missing paper. KO went down into the gulley and another on call from ahead so I pulled her off. I mean out. She yelled OnOn in my ear so loudly I went partially deaf, as well as stupid.
Pack ran on path away from the doi to I think a V or circle that took a minute or so to solve. I had a hunch, dropped thru the orchards and found paper on the path leading up the valley.
I turned left, ran up the valley, took straight at the V, correct guess left up the field from the circle to the little ravine then steep forest path up, up, up. Left is down so it had to be right at the top, it was. After a few hundred metres of lovely flattish, forest trail, right at that V. Left was too obvious! It couldn’t be left, just running through. Wrong.
Bushwhacked back to trail and got the next one right then messed up. A circle in a tricky bit of forest with interconnected spurs. Dogshit and Taste My Buns have come to grief here…with me. Went front right, decent path, Aaah no, the spur to nowhere. Then straight and ….no paper. 360 plus metres wasted. As I returned I saw/heard Snowballs, Byte, Graven and KO piling thru. Snowballs found paper 40m from the circle at 7 o’clock position. Off we went again!
We were running on decent trails along the ridge lines but someone wanted to make it tougher. Wonder who pulls down 200m of paper then leaves the rest? Thank fcuk they do!
At a circle in a glade I took left down the valley towards the A. Wrong, someone called from above. Damn. I bushwhacked again and came out level with FRB Snowballs. Down the ridge towards the farmlands we scampered and a circle in the obvious place. Would Piggee make us loop around further or drop into the ravine? I went towards the drop but OnOn was called straight out of the forest. I charged thru a V here, unseeing.
SB had gone right and Graven straight. I barrelled down after the speeding Image and felt distraught as SB called trail from the other side. Gravity just kept me rolling down and Graven asked:Where the hell you going? as he ran back up past me. Home! I panted.
I knew my trail basically paralleled their trail and hopefully just came back to the A from the other side. And it did. And it was good. Snowballs checked up my trail once home for a few minutes, Jeez, that man had some running in his long legs yesterday.
Nice work hares, good to see how the mind plays tricks and doubts are cast when obvious options appear incorrect even though they aren’t. The psychology of hash running is a much understudied subject. Master’s degree anyone?