| Run 420: | 12 March 2000: Woodcroft Farm, Chalton |
| Hares: | Jan and Jim Vogt |
A good turnout on a lovely sunny morning, those lovely farmyard smells, ahh, great to be alive. There were no visitors or virgins and only a few warnings about hasty trail re-laying on acount of forest working... and we were off ... well sort of. I dont know if there are realy any rules in hashing ?, but if there are then the first check probably broke most of them. We all rushed over the railway bridge and up the steep hill behind the farm, and found the first check half way up. BUT all the trails from here were false, it was a sort of false check. So back over the bridge and passing the chariots (in breach of rule 11) the trail was found out to the northeast along Harris Lane. The general form of the run was a bit like a bent hairgrip, following the eastern side of the valley below Ditcham Park and then turning at the top to return along the western side. Not long after the restart I noticed that Simon had a huge shiggy smear on his back, he was muttering about getting his own back, I didnt make any more inquiries, he was not in a good mood. There was quite a delay in finding the on-on from the third check, all the obvious paths were false, eventualy Jim had to point out a few blobs of sawdust that led up the valley side through what looked like (and was) pretty tough going, but the tough got going and we all arrived at the top. For the next 45 minutes we worked our way through a series of checks that led us down and up and down and up and down and up the eastern side of the valley finaly turning towards home in the middle of West Harting Down (I think). It was obvious by now that this run was going to follow the recent tradition for length. The checks on the return were further apart, and we were going down hill, but it still was a long way back. There were delays caused by trying to get Joyce off the swing in someones garden and of course that steep climb up to Ditcham Park where there was a regroup. Finally a long On In didn't come soon enough.
Formalities were dispensed in the yard, our venerable Joint master made a plea for shorter runs and then began a long list of nominations. Bruce, for faltering at the stile on the way up to the false check, (a good decision as it turned out). The Hares, for all those rule breakages at the start. Paul, because. Robin, for NOT wearing the yellow beret. I think the winner was Miriam, for being an SCB. Drinkies were at the George in Finchdean, for most of us except Mike Brown who went to the Red Lion first.
ON-ON Jan H