Heavy rain and the warning to wear long trousers may have put some of the fainter-hearted hashers off.  But by the time we arrived the sun was out and we had a wonderful run.

We turned West from the pub, did a visit to the Maharajah’s Well for those who had not seen it before, then south down a lane and then turned off the road onto footpaths.   I don’t think I’ve ever had such a lovely trail. It ran through woods nearly all the time.  We continued south, before turning East, making a sharp turn north into Ipsden Woods and back out.  The map looks extraordinarily like a bottom!  Hotlips was running well again.  The Paddle of Rebuke didn’t seem to be slowing her down – oh, wait – it was still in the car!  At every check Big Stiffy instigated talk of Lemony and Wimpey’s holiday in Tunisia.  Well, they blamed him anyway. 

The trail turned north along Busgrove Lane before going East for nearly a mile before crossing Stoke Row Road.  From there we headed north through Bear Wood (where was the picnic?) and Threelandboard Wood (can’t make a joke out of that name) only turning back once we were north of the village.  It was somewhere in these woods that there was a mud jumping competition.  Zorro trotted through lightly only to be followed by Epic Fail jumping double-footed to the other side and Ringer who, although trying the same feat rather ran out of steam (should have done the Didcot 5 miler as training!)

The brambles lived up to Gnome Alone’s warning.  Ringer and Zorro coming off worse than most.  Blood everywhere!

At Hash Words Ringer said “If Carlsberg did hashes, this would probably be the best hash in the world”.  Too True!

As a matter of priority he appointed Zorro RA for next week as Ringer is off drinking again.  He pointed out that the role carried a great responsibility and required a lot of swearing.

There were lots of contenders for the vests this week:

Hot Lips and Big Stiffy arguing in the car and missing the entrance to the car park

Epic Fail lollygagging around and going on about Silverstone (boring!)

But the vest had to go to Rubber Sole for the best bit of videoing on U Tube in a long time!  It was the Tour de North.  Eric then called it up to see a lot of road and wheels, culminating in a rather nice bum.  She watched it twice, exclaiming loudly and was very lucky that the vest was not re-routed her way.

Then Hotlips awarded the Paddle of Rebuke.   She considered Hutch for mentioning Diana Ross and a whole host of hashers for discussing HP Data but it went to Lemony and Wimpey for going on endlessly about their holiday.  I think it was probably the picture of them drinking cocktails in the pool that did it really.

On On

Hare: Gnome Alone

Hounds:  Zorro, Lemony Snicket, Wimpy, Eric, Epic, Rubber Sole, Billy Whizz, , Big Stiffy,  Dancing Queen, Ringer, Dingaling, Hutch, Wilson and Rear Admiral

Date: 8 July 2014

Distance: c4.5 Miles