I was excited. Visa issues, work commitments and an element of following a certain lapsed hash runner around the world meant that I had not (for shame!) run with the hash since The Secret Venue Run back in August. The Nash Hash organising committee meeting had been a pleasant, if not terribly productive 2 hours in Starbucks and it was with some anticipation that I arrived at Panchos, to find a motley crew of the not so usual suspects (7Up, Deep Throat, Mudlark, Slow Sucker, Cunning Linguist, Fellatio, Doggie Style and some dude) . The hares (Battery Operated +1) informed us that it was to be an ‘A to B run’ and that we would not know the final destination until we arrive, victorious at the end of the run (suppress nagging sense of doubt about the sensibleness of this plan).
A little later than planned and we are off, FRB (down down) Slow Sucker, visiting us from the UK again predictably takes the lead and we’re quickly at a check, some milling around ensues and the consensus is that we’re back up the main road. We run for a few minutes before someone reminds us that we’re supposed to be following trail marks and there aren’t any. So we’re back to the first check where the one of the hares is now standing making some weak protestations about marks having been rubbed off.
Now I was under the impression I’d climbed Lao He Shan by every possible route but no, the hares succeeded in sending us up a previously un-charted and yet more difficult route up this little hill. It starts raining (again suppress nagging doubts about sensibleness of not knowing where the end of the run is).
We’re quite quickly up and on to the ridge and it’s actually flat enough to run for a bit. It starts raining (suppress dark sense of foreboding regarding the merits of the plan where we don’t know where the end of the run is). Both 7Up and Fellatio have brought umbrellas. Fellatio says ‘It’s a little bit ridiculous’ I can’t help replying that ‘it’s a very big bit ridiculous’.
Jaunt along the ridge for a bit and yours truly gets altogether unhealthy sense of satisfaction by short cutting in a couple of places (down down). Start to worry that Deep Throat is actually going to push me off the top of the hill if I do it again. Slow Sucker is actually using his head torch (down down) now, it’s officially dark (struggle not to succumb to oppressive sense of dread regarding the fact that we don’t know where the run ends). Slow Sucker perpetrates the most blatant bit of trail wetting I’ve ever witnessed (down down).
Still running along interminable ridge, it’s completely dark and is now raining hard. The flour, to all intents and purposes, has washed away. We start to worry we’ve missed a turn. Slow Sucker runs back to check and I run ahead to look for evidence of a trail, everyone else mills around (down down). We establish that no one has a mobile phone. I come back and find a boar trail through the trees. I come back. Everyone has disappeared. I run forward a few minutes, I shout. I run back a few minutes, I shout. I am alone, it is dark, I am drenched, I don’t know where the hares have taken my bag which contains house keys, wallet and mobile. I am happy.
Finally I begin to hear slow sucker who having found me goes and finds the rest of the pack, we are reunited. Slow Sucker finds a suggestion that flour might once have graced a particular rock we take it as a sign and continue. We arrive at cross roads on the trail, there is no chalk. Deep Throat confesses that she actually knows where the run ends, now we know which is the right trail we are able to find chalk on it, briefly and then it washes away completely.
We come down off the ridge on a particularly higglty-pigglty set of stairs. FRB Slow Sucker leads the way, his head torch succeeds in illuminating the ground directly in front of him while completely destroying my night vision (down down).
From this point on it was just the run in which is usually an opportunity to just put your head down and go. Unfortunately as only one person new where the end of the run was (Battery Operated’s palatial new apartment) it was a stop, start affair as we waited for people to catch up.
Back at said palatial new apartment, the hares had laid on water and beer and pizza was soon ordered. Several soggy people made up excuses and left early and those of us who remained entertained ourselves by giving each other down-downs until the pizza arrived.
It’s great to be back.
DS.