Fools On The Hill

Spot Effin Iceman Hashgate Potty Nutcracker Lemming Mother Theresa Squirrel Foghorn Dutch OldDog SlackBladder Baldrick BGB Krystna Spex LoudonTasteless ShutupWally Ms Whiplash Cheating Twanky TonOpener Miranda and Emma the dog Motox Honeymonster PissQuick Glittertits Amanda and dog Barney Anorak TrainSpotter Zebedee Greg Ms. Whiplash Salome (popped in for a drink later) Finger and Transvestite visiting from Oxford Hash

High Jenks

High Jenks indeed since rather a lot of this particular trail reversed the mammoth, 20-mile race across the lofty hills above Goring the day before which Anorak and TrainSpotter had been daft enough to take part in. This explained their unusually lacklustre approach to today’s Hash and an early departure for a warm footbath and a restorative. The rest of us had taken no part in such foolishness and had no idea of the heights to be scaled ere the day was out. We set forth with a light heart even though Jenks had intimated that less than a bag of flour had been used to mark a lengthy trail.

Unusually, we set out over the river bridge towards Streatley. Or rather, everybody but Spot and I did since we had stupidly decided to check out the trail. It was a fair race to catch up with the Pack again. The bridge spans a beautiful part of the languid river on the upstream which suddenly races underneath to tumble eagerly in fresh cascades over the weir on the other side. OldDog was also tumbling eagerly up the hill away from the river doing the FRBs job with great enthusiasm. The thing she forgot was that 80% of the FRBs time is spent backtracking down False trails. And so it was here. She went from bounding, happy, carefree puppy to foot-dragging, mournful, sad-eyed bloodhound as soon as the ‘F’ appeared. I consoled her with a Bonio and hurried on.

We trolled across a little wooden raised walkway on our way to the riverside and Lemming did his impression of ‘Riverdance’ in the flooded area in front of us, splashing all and sundry until Finger and TrainSpotter chased, but failed to catch, the elfin creature. I swear Lemming hit 30 mph with leopard-like swerves as he outpaced his pursuers. The similarity to such a fine creature ends with Lemming’s turn of speed since a) the leopard has hair, and b) the only spots Lemming has are on his a*se.

Cheating attempts a lone ascent of the South Col

Motox finally reappeared to join Iceman and Baldrick and the rest of us as we trotted blithely down a woodland path towards a rather nasty three way Check. Motox rather ingenuously took the downhill track while BGB and I took the uphill. I believe Spot and Foghorn went straight on. Mind you, everyone except Motox met up again in the wood where Spot had found an ‘F’ after five blobs! A fairly typical example of the Jenksian school of Hash trail laying. It turned out to be the Short Cut so we all had to trek back uphill in order to traipse down a different massive hill littered with flint rocks and dusty earth. Zebedee had already reached the Check at the bottom and gone the wrong way (how many times did he do that today?) so Greg, SlackBladder and I chatted pleasantly awhile Until ShutupWally arrived, insisting on introducing Greg despite the fact that we had already met. We didn’t hang around for long.

Of course, in Hashing terms what comes down has to go up and the next Check took Foghorn and Baldrick on another journey high into oxygen-free territory up the mother of all hills. By the time they reached the top Foghorn looked like Paula Radcliffe at the Olympics – but with a beard – and Baldrick looked like his namesake would after a particularly hard night on the turnip ale. Looking back from the summit a line of Hashers could be seen slowly struggling and swearing up the virtually flour-free track towards a smiling Kitten who was standing savouring his handiwork. And a little further on was Jenks who obviously felt sorry for us since he waved us on over a False rather than insisting we took the loop. What a fine chap!

Luckily for us this was our last uphill sojourn for the day and we began to descend rapidly, almost too rapidly down a makeshift series of earth steps designed to trip anyone who wasn’t concentrating hard. But we all made the road safely and Baldrick found the damp track through the trees that led off it down across an ‘F’ on the Out trail by the bridge. A swift sprint across past PissQuick and Spex saw us to the pub where, guess what, Zebedee was trotting towards us and away from the car park! It’s got to be an age thing. And talking of aberrant behaviour, there in the car park was Foghorn, laying down next to his car to get a bit of rest when Miranda, of all people, suddenly leapt astride him and went for the winning post like Frankie Dettori aboard Racing Certainty in the 2 o’clock at Cheltenham. Luckily for him she didn’t have a whip. And I thought she was such a refined lady!

So it was an arduous trail for the Long runners and not that easy for the Shorts – even those who ran over a Bar – but the views by the river and on the hills were stunning and it was nice not to go on the ‘usual’ trail. Thanks Jenks and Kitten. On On. Hashgate.

Down Downs

RA Glittertits presented the following :-

Excellent start with only minor spillage

Up and Coming

Grand Skittles Evening

Saturday April 23^rd at 19:30. Venue is the Civil Service Club, James Lane, Burghfield. Gridref: 675676. Cost £7.50 to include chicken or scampi and chips. Drinks are sensibly priced. Skittles winner keeps the BH³ cup for the year! What could be more enticing? For more details call 0118 958 3887.