HZH3 Hash #145 – “The Temples, Tall Trees, Tea Fields and Towering Hills Run” – (briefly) re-Hashed…

HZH3 Hash #145 – The Temples, Tall Trees, Tea Fields and Towering Hills Run – 16 August 2014

Meeting point/Bash venue: XiJian Tea House (Cha Zhuang), 58 TianZhu Road (actually a wide path – just 300m south of LingYin Temple Park gate) 天竺路58-60号, 溪涧茶庄 (从灵隐寺公园门口外往南几百米)

Hares: Sweet FA and Phonebox

Report by lead Hare, Sweet FA (i.e. yours truly):

It had been a fairly rainy week, but I had my fingers crossed that Saturday would be mostly dry… As Phonebox was caught in traffic, I headed off to set the first part of the trail. It was through a natural forest area, and then a light, but steady, rain started falling… and the skies were ominously dark grey…

I got halfway through the first section in the forest and the heavens really opened up. The steps in the forest park were like water slides and my glasses fogged up and I could barely see 5 metres in front of me clearly. Then I went back on to dirt trails in the forest, which had now become soft and slippery mud. During the preceding week I had spent about 6 or 7 hours over 3 days focused on this first kilometre of the Hash, but after falling down a few times and taking off my useless fogged up glasses I found that (my own eyes were almost as useless… and) I had somehow lost the trail I had hiked several times during the week… For a minute or two I worried that I was stuck in my own solo version of the Blair Witch Project…

As heavy rain pelted down, I tried to find a way to regain the trail in the forwards direction, but I didn’t recognise any landmarks ahead and although I also tried hard to find a new route around the apparently new obstacles in my path I was unsuccessful. I gave up and trudged back to the meeting venue in defeat and soaked to the bone… A Hare’s darkest hour. 🙁

But, enough about me.

When I returned to the meeting venue I found Phonebox plus the 3 Shanghai Hashers who had arrived earlier and gone for a casual 11km jog before lunch… Phonebox and I talked and we decided that we should just give up on the first section we had planned for the runners and just do a single track for runners and walkers. I’ll save that gem for a future Hash! 😉 We also decided just to set a semi-live Hash. Time for a big bowl of warm noodles!

With some people WeChatting that they were stuck in traffic or running late (e.g. our esteemed G.M., HEIDE) and others making excuses and saying they were heading home, Phonebox and I set off just after 3pm giving us about a 1 hour headstart on the Hashers… Plenty of time, we thought…

We set the trail through tall treed forests, bamboo forests, along quiet country lanes, through tea fields set in another bamboo forest, past buddhist temples with chanting monks, and more tea fields, up steep hills, along mountain ridges, past mountainside tea fields, then down slippery hillside paths, and past yet more tea fields and bamboo forests and finally home past traditional villas and more temples and back to the Bash venue.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, just as the Hares reached about the 3/4 mark they were caught by the FRBs (front running bastards!). They agreed to a tactical 10 – 15 minute regroup. Luckily it was at a spectacular lookout point (although it was pretty foggy, they still took lots of pretty pictures). The Hares were still caught again just 100-200m from Home. Well done to the FRBs and the Pack.

After the Hash, about half the group stayed around for the Bash dinner. It was very hearty and delicious. I’m sure that we’ll return to this Bash venue again. For the record, they do great big vegetarian soups too. A meal in a bowl!

1. On to the first hill and into the forest.

2. Spectacular misty views of LongJing Village from the top of the ridgeline!

3. The lookout (now known as “Hares’ downfall”…).

4. The scenic downhill trail.

See more great HZH3 Hash #145 photos on our HZH3 Google Photos page here (click link). Thanks to those people I stole photos from on our WeChat group and to those who sent in photos to our HZH3 email address. We love getting your photos!