From a hare's perspective the day starts far too early. Some hares have mastered the art of laying a trail at the last minute, others such as yours truly are ultra conservative which means Soapbox and I set off at the crack of dawn heavily laden with too much flour clutching our maps and hoping we could remember all the nuances of the trail. Eventually, after the odd minor panic about shortcuts for walkers, which we had overlooked, we have laid the trail and returned to the chariot with loads of time to spare and loads of unused flour. Waiting for hashers to turn up we make bets on who will turn up first and I win as The Ref's chariot rumbles over the rough flint gravel into the carpark at about thirtyfive minutes before the off.
The day was turning out to be warm and humid with scattered sunshine as a
reasonable pack assembled, Flash arriving in his classic car and Pancsi and
Godiva were preparing to give young Leighton a push chair outing.
So after a short delay we, the hares, were allowed to tell our usual lies and direct the pack out north west down the road, we were carrying flour because the trail that lay ahead involved some real time modification.
The first part of the route was an anticlockwise loop up through Wildhams Wood
around the eastern side of Coldcroft Copse back to the first check. This loop caused
no notable problems, Spiderman was complaining a bit about being held back by one of
his bionic hips, Flash was breakfasting on some of the abundant blackberries and Mussolini
second guessed the loop by returning to the first check via the road.
Back at the start of the second loop we then headed back down the steep path to the road and On-In after one hour and twenty minutes.
There were a few nominations, which alas I forget, and the Hash-It was given to Soapbox
for being too much of a gentleman in asking The Chamois if she wanted him to carry it.
Bambi.
on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on-on | |||||||||||||||||||||||||