…in the Woods?

Hare One Eyed Jack had been absent for Serbian Bomber’s run three weeks ago from the same location, the big car park half way up Tai Mo Shan at Tsuen Kam Au. Grumbling hashers complained that there was no free boutique Aussie beer and this obviously accounted for the low turnout. “You’re getting a better run!” growled the scowling hare. “How would you know?” came the rejoinder. “You weren’t even here!”

And so the pack of nine (Red Rump, Eunuch, Penile Dementia, Gaele Says No, Liberace, Golden Balls, Mango Groove, Velcro Lips and Dram) streamed out of the car park and uphill towards Tai Mo Shan. “Are yoo!” was detected from the gloom among the raucous shouting. Then Eunuch, who started a couple of minutes late from putting on his ankle armour, spotted an arrow on the corner leading down to Route Twisk. The first of many moronic trail choices by the frbs during the course of the run.

We all streamed out along Route Twisk following trail north until we came to a checkback. Liberace was first to head down the obvious route into the management centre and the Tai Lam Country Park ridge road, but returned after a while, claiming there was “nothing”. “Nothing will come of nothing. Speak again!” spake Golden Balls, but the pack ignored this blatant Shakespearean portent of disaster, and crossed the road to look for trail up the hill.

After a fruitless search Gaele Says No went down into the management centre and within 30 metres found trail. “On on!” he called to a chorus of curses directed at Liberace. We soldiered up the road for quite a distance before we heard the unmistakable soprano of Liberace, who had been most eager to get up the hill, in the distance: “Ah yoo?” “No!” “Sod off!” and “You homo Liberace!” were a few of the more printable responses to his query.

Eventually a checkback was encountered and the pack fanned out to north and south looking for trail, but Golden Balls, mindful of the hare’s reminder to check back to the last on-on, went back down to the management centre and looked south. On on!

The by now strung out pack enjoyed some nice trail running with a couple of clever checks to shake them around a bit, until they came out on Route Twisk at Chuen Lung, where they found Golden Balls calling trail, having hashcrafted his way to the front. Trail then led along a concrete track into a village area and then uphill. Up to this point the run had been pleasant but fairly average, on nice previously hashed trails. All that was about to change as a checkback led to finding trail in the shiggy to the west of the concrete track on an overgrown and at times obscure old path through the forest, over fallen trees, across stream beds and up up up. “F*ckin excellent shiggy!” gasped Liberace as he passed Golden Balls, having screwed up yet again. Meanwhile at the front of the pack Red Rump bounded home first, followed by Eunuch and Penile Dementia. Gaele Says No and Liberace came in next, having gone wrong just before the finish, followed by Golden Balls. “Have you seen Mango?” “No.” “But he was right there in the shiggy.” “Twat’s lost again!” “For a boffin he’s got absolutely no sense of direction.”

Calls for the hare to go out and look for him were ignored, so we resorted to complaining about how boring the run was and exactly the same as Serbian Bomber’s. Time went by. Nobody was worried about Mango Groove. More time went by. “I know we’re supposed to wait until after the circle,” said Velcro Lips, “but shall we have the curry now?” For indeed the ex-GM had brought a pot of chicken curry, a pan of rice and a basket of crusty baguettes. Nom nom nom went the pack, and then Mango was spotted running in from the north like a great ravening polar bear or something.

“What a twat!” he said of himself.

Amen to that and a very good run from One Eyed Jack with an excellent shiggy mile to end on.