26th July 2009 - Wheathill Plantation - Groucho

In complete contrast to last weekends poor turnout of 6, this weeks joint hash with Isca for their Roman Away Weekend turned out to be the biggest turnout of the year. In excess of 70 hashers were bused to Woodbury from all over the country.
The hare, Groucho was set to prove that you can have a successful hash with more than 1 trail and with help from his 2 trustee assistants (Blobhoblin and Tampa) had laid 3 trails to choose from.
A pink trail for any youngsters (or hashers who had over-indulged in the frivolities of 2 nights at the ISCA away weekend), a clockwise trail and an anti-clockwise trail. This involved hashers splitting into 2 groups to run the trail in differing directions. Checks would have to be interpreted carefully as they would be kicked out the way you had just come from, and there were plenty of double edged fish-hooks!
Blobhoblins Group set off with Radiohead (honorary visitor) setting off in the wrong direction. I guess this is what happens when you drive for 24 hours across France and arrive at 5am but still commit to running a hash that same morning! Tuned-In took a lighter approach being 6 months pregnant with peanut and kept pace with a leisurely stroll.
The usual suspects from City of Exeter did the hash proud by taking most of the fish-hooks. Spocky, Radiohead, Twice Daily, Runs Again and Stat-Nav happily checked out the route for the larger group of sluggish hashers. Stix kept a continual count to ensure there was no fear of him reaching a fish-hook by having 5 hashers up front. He struggled to count from 1-5 and so still managed to blag himself a fish-hook!
A few cunning twists and turns by the hare and we arrived at a hash halt by the reservoir. Mouldy and Creeper took charge of entertainment with mud wrestling - who could cover the other in the most mud.... including in the mouth! Utterley Buttocks arrived on the scene and rapidly joined in the competition.
To the cry "check it out", Spocky and Radiohead led and many followed. Harsh words were spoken as they fought over who was going to check the favoured path.
Miraculously for Groucho, both groups met up at the Sweetie Stop at the same time. Chesty felt this was an achievement worth congratulating. Buzby pointed out that for a Groucho hash, the achievement was the fact the trail met up at all - the timing was just a sheer fluke!
As we set off for part 2 of the trail, Creeper was concerned that having sat in a puddle (or was she pushed by Mouldy??) her bum was wet. Utterly Buttocks was concerned she had worn the wrong pants so couldnt take off her muddy shorts to get on the bus home. Creeper went one better and claimed she had no pants and would be going commando!
The excitement was clearly too much for Cathusalem who very quickly offered that if this was the case, Creeper was definitely travelling home in his car!
The hash continued through the woods and we soon arrived back at the car park to meet the bus. A fine spread of cider, beer, pop, crisps and chocolate biscuits awaited! Sheer extravagance for the City of Exeter hashers.
Everyone was cordially invited to the on down - a BBQ at Topsham Rugby Club which finished the days hash nicely and was a fitting end to Isca's Roman away jobby (as officially named by Sore-Point).
Thank you Isca for your hospitality enjoyed by all.

19th July - Knowles Wood CP, Broadhembury - Sore Point + Paperwork

Well, what can I say, where were you all comes to mind?

Two trusty hares waiting at the car park with only Baglady for company. Shortly after 11 up turned Blobhoblin, then a visitor from Taunton, dotCom. So, three hashers, two hares. Mmmm. There was then a bit of excitement as a van towing a banger car couldn’t get up the hill, making plumes of smoke as his wheels turned to no avail. DotCom helped him get on his way and the stream of traffic backed up behind could move on. This must be the rest of the hashers we said. No, it wasn’t. At 11.15 we thought we’d better set off and who comes screeching round the corner – Twice Daily with Pebbledash and Runs Again on board. Hooray! In one car they had doubled the pack.
Deciding not to wait any longer, off we went on a perfect trail through the woods. It was a perfect run, even if I do say so myself! Well, no-one else wanted to do the blog so I may as well blow my own trumpet! It was decided to call an amnesty as there was no sherrif, no GM, no anyone really, and what is really bad is there was NO BEER MASTER! Who had the beer? Why was it not sent along? How could we impose the £1 levy if there was no beer and peanuts? This also meant no fines so nerd names were used without penalty and a very fine time was had by all!
With a packet of sweets each at the regroup off we went again. Blobhoblin decided to roll in the mud – not sure why – perhaps he felt like a hippo and wanted to cool off? Photographic evidence has been obtained. After just about the hour we returned to the car park, trail found and run and the rain had held off too. As we had no beer we had no circle, but Twice Daily came to the rescue with just the right amount of brownie squares that she had in her car for just such an emergency. Wonderful! Thank you for the few that came, it was very much appreciated by the hares – and to the rest of you – you missed a very nice trail!!!
On On. Sorepoint
NB. Has everyone died of swine flu??????? ED.

12th July - Warren CP - Tampa

We were graced with 24 hashers today plus 2 four legged friends,but no Sherriff,was he sailing the seven seas we all wondered, or perhaps drinking Pimms on the deck.Anyway up stepped Spocky and offered to be acting sherriff, is he good at acting then someone was hear to ask !
Tampa explained in Tampa-speak the finer points of his trail or was it trial then off we went, well we didn't go far with many of the pack pretending to look for the trail whilst the gallant few went on searching.After about ten minutes the trail was found, on a route that Spocky had already checked out, so he told us.Everything went well for the next five minutes until we hit a bog with islands of turf for us to jump to or suffer wet feet, many of the pack were not good jumpers and many choice words could be heard when entering the water.Woodpecker was not happy with one aspect of cunning adminstered by the hare which involved a back arrow swiftly followed by a check-back, that's not right, he was heard to say using one of his many character voices.The Sherriff was of course informed.
Standards were maintained at the sweet stop where sweets and chocolate were up for grabs and believe me most of the chocolate was grabbed first.It was like watching gannets feed.This pause was quickly followed by a long short split however Isocelese claimed that had found another trail that he had taken called the M route,he was the only one on it.He is you be glad to know not still wandering over Woodbury Common on his own M route as we did manage to find him.Tail-lamp called on three at one point, no on four though, some of us wondered in fact we are still wondering.
Once back at the car park The Sherriff collected the fines inviting fellow hashers to stitch others up.However there was a catch as the stichers or snitchers were also fined.
It should be noted that one member of todays pack arrived with a pair of brand new trainers and managed to escape the beer from a trainer christening.How did they do this ! Well before leaving to come to the hash they entered their greenhouse and plastered their trainers with John Innes Garden Compost,how cunning is that !
Rumour has it that the offending trainers are at the present time size 9 but may in a matter of days become size 10.

Thanks to Groucho for the blog.

5th July - Four Firs CP - Ditto + Big Bangers

On arriving in the car park at 10.55am we were a little thin on the ground, 4 hashers and 3 hares!!! By 11am though we had managed to gather about 17 hashers in total. It was to be an interesting day in the world of hashing as the first thing we were told was that there were 2 trails laid today with a total of 4 hares!!! Usual hash organisation then! Big Bangers and Ditto had laid their virgin trail but Groucho and Blobhoblin had also laid a trail. Tampa, in his absence, was blamed for this confusion as he was apparently meant to inform Groucho that Ditto had confirmed he could hare this trail....but he didn't! In Tampas defence (no this won't happen again, make the most of it!!) it was on the blog as Ditto being the hare, (more by luck than judgement!!!!).

Anyway, after much bartering as to whose trail would be the best, Big Bangers had homemade lemonade, Groucho had fruit pastilles and liquorice allsorts, Big Bangers had strawberries and chocolate, she won! Though I think the general consensus was you can't possibly abandon a virgin hares trail......that would be too mean, even for hashers! We were warned the trail may be too long and too short (!) there were fish hooks but they didn't mention that we would encompass all the main points of Woodbury Common!

Eventually we set off with Groucho keeping a close eye that we didn't end up crossing trails. Once across the road it decided to rain, much to Horny Womans delight, she was hoping for a wet shirt competition, the rain promptly stopped again then. On to a regroup where we then split up on a long, short split with the longs going via Woodbury I believe, judging by the state of them when they finally caught us up. Well after having ten minutes to chat, Bag Lady, Tuned In, Sorepoint and Horny Woman found it quite inconvenient to be told, 'On On'!

On on we went with the FRB's returning to us because of the fish hooks, once was labelled a 'Spocky fish hook' which he found very unfair, can't imagine why?

After what felt like years (only an hour!) we reached the homemade lemonade stop where Ditto had brought beer aswell! We scoffed the chocolate and strawberries then from here some of the lazier hashers got a lift back with Big Bangers while the others made their way back on trail, via Budleigh maybe??

Back at the car park at 12.45! We circled up while Spocky named Juliet Big Bangers after some deliberation about what she should be called, Paperwork had a strong leaning toward Uranus which was getting a little worrying! Whilst other astronomy type names were thrown in we settled on Big Bang for it to be changed at the last minute to Big Bangers.

Various fines were handed out by sheriff, obviously to Groucho for laying a trail unnecessarily and more obviously to Tampa who was fined in his absence for not keeping Groucho fully informed!

On On to next weeks trail at Warren CP, Woodbury Common.

28th June - Exton Farm - Woodpecker

The hashers all started to arrive in the farmyard of yet another of Woodpecker's friends. We couldn't hear the instructions very well, as the road right next door was so noisy, but I'm sure Woodpecker said there would'nt be any fishooks as he didn't believe in them and our feet would definately stay dry. I suppose no-one said he had to tell the truth on his birthday did they?

On was called over the road and into a field with a lovely pair of horses. We'd been told to keep dogs on a lead with sheep and cows, but no-one mentioned the horses. Here came the first lie - straight into a stream and we had to trudge along it for a little way. A bit cold, but not too bad since we've been having good weather lately. Up we went into another field. Lots of beautifully untouched fields of clover as this was a hash "by kind permission" of course, and not necessarily on footpaths.

Dr Jekyll was moved to run straight through the middle of one field a la Little House on the Prairie. I thought professional people were supposed to have more morals? Oh no, silly me, that doesn't apply to hashing!

The first regroup was called at the edge of a road to bring us all together before taking our life in our hands. Woodpecker was heard to utter a very rude word when he couldn't make himself heard above the traffic. Funny what things carry, and what doesn't, especially when little ears are around. Off we went again through a yard with lots of coaches and trailers. One man tending the engine got quite upset with Bushbabie when she dared to show an interest in the coupling between trailer and truck. He definately didn't want to show her his etchings!

Twin Peaks and Howling Wilf were both doing a great job of calling the shots today. Miss Peaks was referred to as "a little dynamo" on more than one occasion, moving our visiting hasher from Turkey to comment that his dynamo had gone in for a service.

Up and over a field full of little yellow flowers. Some discussion about what this was, maybe Rape, but a bit stunted - must be mini-rape then or Rap as Spocky put it. The sweeties were eventually found hidden under the mulch of an ornamental bed on the Woodbury Trading Estate.

Despite the attempts of various walking hashers (you know who you are - X-bits) who tried to re-hide the sweeties away from the rest of the pack. On again, over the road and into yet another stream. This one was even longer, deeper and worse than the last, resulting in many hashers getting wet underwear. Woodpecker says, it only goes up to here, pointing to a point mid thigh, but of course he is a lot taller than a lot of the lady hashers. No-one actually took the name "cold bits" but it could have been used if necessary.

Mind you, later on we went down an extremly muddy track and everyone was wishing we had the stream back to clean off - you just can't win sometimes can you! On back it was.

Sherrif handed out fines to Howling Wilf for doing a fishhook even though 5 people had already done it - someone tell him the rules, don't think he's got the hang of it yet! Other fines went to X-bitz and co-conspirators for hiding the sweets and a couple of others that I've forgotten.

Howling Wilf used the eeny meeny miney mo method of choosing the next recipient for the pink handbag - which came out at the Sherrif, so he used diplomacy and tact and chose Blobhoblin instead!

The majority then retired to Chez Woodpecker for a swim (Itzy obviously needs a sibling!), excellent food provided by Mrs Woodpecker and a game of tough rugby. I know that should read Touch Rugby - but you weren't there! Some hashers (Tampa) just don't know when to stop!!! He even pushed the Birthday boy over at one point - surely that deserves a fine??

Woodpecker handed out some wonderful lime green T-shirts to commemorate the occasion and we rounded up all the beetles in the area by wearing them in the garden. Thank you Woodpecker and Mrs Woodpecker for another wonderful day.

On On.Sorepoint