| Date | Hare | Scribe |
|---|---|---|
| 9 Jul 2023 | Simon & Ainslie | Kevin |
The saying goes something like “All roads lead to Kempsford” or in the case of today’s hash not quite. There was in fact only one access route into the village due to many road closures. Thankfully, as a result of the multiple emails sent out giving directions, a good number of hashers still managed to find their way to The George.
Ainslie proceeded to give a briefing on the dot of 11:00am to those of us in who were in a listening mode. Jeremy heckled from the back saying “Don’t bother with the briefing, nobody listens!”. I think he was still annoyed that the walkers had paid no attention to his briefing at his hash two weeks previously and that they had instead decided to follow whatever route they fancied.
Maurice turned up late with Rocky – I think the sun was about to set – and he said “Is the briefing still going on? It must be the longest hash briefing ever”. I think he was concerned that Ainslie might take away one of his KVH3 world records! What Maurice didn’t realise, or David for that matter, was that Ainslie’s hash would set a KVH3 record (read on to discover more).
To those who were listening, Ainslie explained that her trail was in the shape of a lollipop and that we would be going out and coming back along the same route and doing a loop at the top of the stick. Ainslie made it quite clear that we should only follow the flour marks on our right hand side – there would be flour marks on the other right hand side for the route back and they also included the marks for the short/medium/long divides.
The trails were to be just under four miles for the short, nearly six for the long – the medium correctly being somewhere in between. One other item Ainslie wanted to bring to our attention was that she had run out of flour towards the end of laying her trail and had to kick out one of her own check marks so that we had some idea of which direction to take.
With many of us having to get back in time for a lunch booking for 1:00pm it was then ON! ON!
So just after 11am, out of the pub car park and to the right, we ran or toddled diligently following Ainslie’s instructions – and flour marks – out towards Hannington Wick.
With the runners long gone, about half a mile later we – GOM, Mrs GOM & Kay – came across an intersection with two arrows on the left hand side of the road, one pointing in the direction back to Kempsford, the other pointing left. These were possibly the directions for Ainslie’s S/M/L trails but there were no letters to confirm if this really was the point of the trail which determined the divides.
We decided to stick to Ainslie’s rule of only following flour marks on the right and so carried on along the road to Hannington Wick, where more dots on the right confirmed we were going in the correct direction. The remainder of the walkers some 200 yards (not quite 200 metres) back noticed the same two arrows and were about to go off trail when the lead walkers beckoned them ON! ON! to follow the correct trail.
Ainslie’s trail took us to Hannington Wick, the outskirts of Castle Eaton and back to Kempsford and to the location of the possible S/M/L divide. GOM, Mrs GOM & Kay reached this location around 12:30pm and as we had walked just over four miles at this point we decided to return straight to The George – thus completing the possibly correct short trail at 12:40pm. The total distance for our trail was 4.7 miles thus setting a new KVH3 record for the longest short trail.
Having returned to The George there were a good few walkers and runners still to appear and Ainslie was getting concerned about those booked to have lunch at 1:00pm. Most did return just in time for GOM to give a very brief thanks to Ainslie before 14 of us went off to lunch. A proper recognition of Ainslie’s efforts will be made at the next hash.
It was good to see David return to the fold today following a lengthy lay off / holiday and wearing the bags which had been presented to him back in the dark ages. He is also supposed to have the horn – but I’m not sure if he brought it along.
I had been eager for David to be present for the speech so that he could present the bags and the horn to one of our fellow hashers but that didn’t happen because he was nowhere to be seen.
Sometime after 1:30pm those remaining outside felt a few drops of rain and prepared to leave. However, David and Phil still hadn’t appeared, so Jane, John and Viv had to await their return.
Jeremy WAS able to leave and driving back encountered David and Phil walking along the country road from the Cricklade direction – how they ended up there they will no doubt be willing to explain at some point. They were however quite happy to get a lift back to the pub. Was their particular “short” walk yet another record?