| Run 413: | 21 November 1999: Ipping Common |
| Hares: | Joyce Porrett and Dave Barclay |
A small to middling pack gathered in the car park, the weather was dry, grey but not too cold. Malcolm had sent a sick note so our mastresses allocated the hash shit to Brian because he didn't take a step back like everyone else. The Spooners were back in the groove, screetching into the car park at the last moment. There were two warnings from the hares, firstly not to overrun the regroup and secondly to beware of frisky cows. Off we went south by southwest. A bit of scampering around (and some LONG falsies that were a feature of this hash) and we soon reached the cows the only challenge they presented was how to avoid putting a foot in the brown puddings with which they had mined the field. Here we had an impromptu regroup while we waited for Mike Brown to stop kicking the Partington dogs and for them to rejoin the pack. Mike seemed to have come off worse, with badly grazed knees but all the sympathy was for the dogs.
Some of the pack shortcutted over the bridge at the bottom of the field while the purists splashed through the stream on the official trail and we all headed roughly south by southeast to the next big check right in the middle of the half flooded sandpit. Several falsies and notrails here split the pack up. Heading due East there was one more check before we reached the regroup at the sports field on the edge of Midhurst. The regroup took a while, and for a while no one noticed Paul who had got there so early he was sitting on the bench at the far end of the field.
Regrouped and an hour gone! we headed North by Northwest (was a plane chasing us ?) toward the main road emerging at that little bit that used to be the old road. Somewhere in this section was a neat little trick, first a check on the edge of a steep down hill with the on being down the hill, no experienced hasher is going to check downhill if they can help it. Then shortly after a falsie from a check near the bottom that went back up the climb a bit further along. Many took the bait and some even shortcutted to the falsie climbing the steepest part of the grade, all the while a hare standing there grinning.
This account has gone on long enough, a bit like the run, but its not over yet. The final section was over Stedham common back to the chariots. Even here the route was not straightforward, there was one ginormous falsie on the direct line in, the route being a bit more to the South and then the on in, 1 hour and 40 mins by my watch.
Slurpies were at the pub in Bepton where nominations were for Paul (sitting on the bench), Jan V (warmup exercises), strangely not Mike for cruelty to animals. Robin took the honours because he could not remember the inscription on bench having spent ages looking at it.
ON-ON Jan H