| Date | Hare | Scribe |
|---|---|---|
| 6 Aug 2023 | Margaret & John | Jeremy |
Mr and Mrs GOM were away and Mr GOM had kindly volunteered me as stand in. Unfortunately, he hadn’t also arranged a scribe and when I asked for volunteers everyone immediately took a brisk step backwards as in good military fashion.
Clearly no mag is deserved this week – but you are obviously getting one, so bad luck.
Arriving eventually at the venue (queues coming off the A419), the hares seemed relieved that hashers had indeed turned up, and it was a bit later than normal before we could try to get things started. First off was the group photo, which was like trying to herd cats. After much faffing about as to where the group should stand and in which direction, the photo was taken and then retaken, and retaken. Odd things were happening so I have included various snaps so that you can play Spot The Difference to work out which cats were causing the disruption.
Margaret was then able to brief us on the walking route in her normal quiet voice. I struggled to hear what she said, except that there were Alpacas to be seen.
The deafness part reminds me of when I was sent by Catherine to Specsavers last year for a hearing test. They put me in a cubicle next to an office with people talking on the phone – couldn’t hear a damn thing and oddly enough failed. That seemed a bit rum, so I demanded a re-test in a quiet location and the following day was deemed to have been satisfactory. Phew! However, Catherine still thinks I’m deaf and talk too loudly. No convincing some people and the louder I deny it the less she believes me.
Anyway, back to the hash and the few walkers having set off John then provided more specialist info on the long route, which included details of invisible flour, gaps in hedges, right turns, left turns, edges of fields, and hashing in a straight line.
However, the route was definitely picturesque – especially Ampney Crucis itself – but I wouldn’t want to live there.
We found the invisible flour, the relevant right and left turns and gaps in hedges. However, we sometimes failed to spot the visible flour, and Janet and Viv never saw any Alpacas so I include a picture for their and anyone else’s benefits.
I mostly jogged along with Maurice who as usual had a tale to tell – does he make them up? This was about walking recently with some grandchildren (his I assume) and coming across a collapsed gentleman. Of having to put him in the recovery position and then having to perform CPR. Despite this the gentleman recovered and eventually sat up and firmly demanded he be taken to the nearby church to attend a funeral, which is what duly happened. Not sure if this walk had been on Craggy Island but it does rather sound like an episode from Father Ted.
Back at the pub we found that there was no water supply and hardly any customers, so we had the place mostly to ourselves. Coffee and tea were unavailable, also lager shandy, but beer and bottled soft drinks were, so all was mostly saved.
We sat and discussed how excellent the hash had been and then moved on to the challenges of getting older, and failing memories. Names are the thing that sometimes get me – although I can often remember the initial and then eventually the full name pops out. If Keith has the same problem then I congratulate him on choice of partner.
David and the hash shorts were nowhere to be seen – who did he give them to last time? We do hope both reappear soon.
We all appreciated the trail laid by Margaret & John, gave them a round of applause and look forward to seeing them again soon. Please, no talk of retiring.
PS
The Gloucestershire Vintage and County Extravaganza was the cause of the traffic jam on our arrival. I never knew it existed, and if, like me, you have any passing interest in vintage vehicles then perhaps you should go visit the Extravaganza as well next year.
PPS
Margaret writes: Jan and Malcolm laid the trail with us at The Crown at Ampney Crucis. Malc had a tool which he brought with him to cut down a really thick branch at the end of the little wood to save us all from having to bend very low to enable us to exit the wood.