Cold hands mean a warm heart, they say, and there was no shortage of the former in the two degree drizzly air on Iping common.

We circled up to welcome back Hash Princess and Carina, and learn that this venue was first used on July 22nd 1984 by Miriam and Roger Freeman, I bet it was a bit warmer on that day.

Two Ferrets told us that the falsies had been seeded with little red hearts in honour of an imminent St Valentine's Day before ushering us east across the road into Stedham Common.

Contrary to the expectations of most of the pack the trail went north east down hill towards the 272 over slippery roots to the small black pond with Prancer in front.

We milled about aimlessly here for quite a while until a Hare must have given Canman a nudge to send us south up hill through the heather and back on to the common.

Just like many in the pack, I was trying to explore every falsie, looking for a heart, so I did not have time to properly eaves drop on an interesting conversation that was going on between Snake Charmer and Dag, as I passed them I heard "bend over and have a slapped bottom" from Snake Charmer, it almost diverted me from the hunt for a heart.

It must be said that this Hash incorporated some very long falsies, so as we reached Minsted road and milled around again, the sound of Kinky's horn could be heard well to the East on the path to Woolmer Bridge while the rest headed west on the muddy path around the sand pit in the gloom of the rhododendrons.

There are two paths in parallel here, and the Hares did not miss the trick of having a check on the one with the continuation on the other, leaving the pack to hack its way through the bush between.

We made our way round to the entrance to Fitzhall, and then through the plantation and back across the road to a regroup.

The restart saw Pancsi returning from a long falsie north clutching his heart. He was happy enough though because back on the trail west there was a fish hook that caught the unlikely grouping of Dogwhistle, Spider Woman, Catrina, Hash Princess and Bambi.

Next we re-crossed the road north for real and although a bunch of the usual suspects tried to take the shortest path home we did reach the On-In after one hour and nine minutes of frantic heart searching hashing.

Two Ferets and Hairbrush then presented lovely yellow roses to all the hashers of a female persuasion and chocies to the major collectors of the little red hearts. I know Pancsi had six and Kinky four.

Three hashers stood at the centre of The Circle, Dag for something to do with a lack of effort leading to a big drop of profit at Nationwide, Carina for losing a shoe in the bog, and Bambi for sprinting past Pancsi to "steal" his heart. I write this with the Hash-It round my neck.

The Hamilton Arms was favoured with our custom, where the fire was warm, the service quick and Prancer managed to consume an awful lot of complimentary prawn crackers.