Virgin Hare… what could we expect???
In these write ups, it is rare for me to be overly positive – my attitude generally is that respect, and compliments, need to be earned – if it’s a spade, then I won’t call it a shovel. I’m not good at pandering to people, so sometimes I find myself doing a write up, where I’m clutching at straws to find positives to talk about in a run. Today is not one of those days. With that preamble, I would have to say that today’s run was fucking brilliant.
I could leave it there, but should go into more detail. It was at the back of BJ Ranch near Ob Khan. Frozen has been setting some good runs there, and there are clearly some great trails up in the hills there. Before the run we were all talking about the “Double Check Back V Check” from not so long back, and hoping the virgin hare wouldn’t make a rookie mistake. The hare brief came, and in this case “hare brief” was not the correct description – it wasn’t so much of a “hare long”, but more a passage of time where the hare just told us complete lies. There as a Wimp / Rambo split, but the wimp trail came in at 2.5km, and the Rambo came in at about 5 – not the 7km we were promised!
We set off up the hill towards the other runsite we use (the one with the shelter that could have been useful as rain was threatening!). First check, and I got it wrong, but given where we were, both choices met at the same point. As I paralleled over to the trail I had a dispute with one of the laziest old dogs I’ve ever seen. It was a very old labrador, that had lost its voice, felt like it should bark and be aggressive to me, but just didn’t have the heart to go through with it. Anyway, I came around the hill to the circle check arriving the same time as None of Your Business who looked incredibly disappointed to see me, and promptly sprinted off. I plodded along and for a while Poo and I were feeling old as Willy Walls and NOYB set the pace ahead of us – damn kids these days!
That was all over at the next check as I led the way – and then over my shoulder the loudest caller turned out to be Brown Finger – the co-hare!!! WTF? BF was sticking with his FRB ways, even though he knows the way, he’s got to be up front calling OnOn! I screwed up the next check, and when I caught up some hashers were checking around, while the rest were giving Brown Finger the Spanish Inquisition as he guarded the circle. There was no OnOn call, and BF was being worn down. Eventually he crumbled, and without telling me explicitly where to go, he gave enough away, and I was back on trail. Graven appeared behind me and we started working well as a team putting some distance in past the W/R split. Things were going well.
It was deja vu. Graven and I were working well together up front. Now when I look back at the track from my GPS, it is clear the hares had me completely twisted up in circles – excellent play! I was checking completely in the wrong direction (looking for the 7km run). A bit disoriented, I’m not sure why I kept going wrong at that point, but sure enough some of the pack caught up, and somehow Graven slipped past me. When we got back on trail it was straight forward back to the OnIn and the beer!
A virgin circle running, where many protocols were absentmindedly overlooked. A good circle nonetheless – even with a long story about the US coast guards!