It was another glorious sunny Sunday on woodbury common, for a joint hash between Exeter and Taunton, about 20 of us from Exeter arrived, various excuses were heard for absences from the lame family BBQ, to the partly believable swine flu! Chip Shop arrived rather huffy and puffy in lycra ..... under the guise of cycle training (we would all respect him more if he just admitted..... he just likes wearing lycra!!). Mr Hyde arrived with another hoard of new children - it is rumoured he might have a change of name to Pied Piper .... one would presume he does have the consent of the parents involved?? The Taunton hare gave instructions regarding the hash, and we were off .... to the sound of a rather loud hunter bugel that was the signature tune for the next 100 minutes.
Lots of hills, rough ground and tree roots tried to thwart the hashers, indeed 99% tackled the route without problems. However there's always one....and it was Horny Woman who embarassed herself by tripping in spectacular superman fashion, landing on her front with her customary screech. It was left to Tampa to inform her of his disappointment "as a true Horny Woman you are meant to fall flat on your back !!!" Where upon he realised his un-gentlemanly comments and offered to brush the dust off her front !!! (she was heard to decline his kind offer) She did however diagnose herself as having a fractured femur but refused offers for the air ambulance and instead agreed to take half a paracetamol.
So picture the scene, you are a keen fisherman, you see a wonderfull sunny day for a quiet lakeside fish, just you and nature at its best. You pack up your rods, bait, flies, llittle chairs, umberella, and your little wife makes you a healthy and hearty lunch. You arrive and set up camp several yards from your next contemporary in order to give each other a certain amount of space, peace and quiet........................THEN .....50 or so shouting, bugling, barking and stomping beings, of human and animal kind go thundering past your haven, it must have made their day !!!! However it has to be said that not one of the aforementioned fisherman made any peep of their annoyance. At the end of the lake was one fisherman with a great dane the size of a grand national winner, who stood like a soldier on sentry duty and when hashers passed and made kind and complimentary remarks about his canine friend, just glared ....... some of us decided he was probably the local drug dealer and as we were hashers he felt his business threatened !!! Then it was a break without sweeties for instructions to the real sweetie stop, there was to be one long cut and one short cut ???? Maybe different counties have different languages .... this makes hard going for us newbies i can tell ya :) annnnnnyway off we walked, jogged, or ran up the hill to yet more beautiful countryside. THEN it was sweetie stop with various forms of sugar and stickyness enjoyed by all !!
Then it was over a wooden bridge with a man taking photos of what was spied by the children as a little terrapin sunning himself on the end of a large fallen log (the terrapin - not the man!) Then it was another 10 or 15 mins of hashing through various terrain and undregrowth to the car park where various liquids were consumed heartily. Next week its Squabmoor with Stat nav and Chesty ...... next door to where we where today.
Many thanks to Horny Woman for volunteering her services as scribe, nice one.