As the clock struck half past the hour 4 brave souls waited outside the Hambro Arms. Eager to begin the evening’s festivities it was at this point that the absence of the hare was identified. But no sooner had the thought been uttered than Madness came gliding down the road with a small bag of dust. Walt quickly deduced that this would be our starting direction even though the hare made a feeble attempt at a bluff by walking 10 feet past us and staring in the opposite direction. The dismay was obvious in our hare’s eyes when he saw our meagre numbers and feared he had laid the “trail of trails” for 4 men and a dog. But true to form the usual late arrivals began to appear and end the end we had a total of 13, including a gentlemen by the name of Stan Kingsbury who decided that he would rather run through the woods in the dark with a bunch of strangers than spend his wedding anniversary with his spouse. Not that I am one to judge. Introductions were made and Madness provided a brief review of the rules. His explanation of the course was rather vague and this was attributed initially to the belief by Quelque Chose that perhaps he had not laid the trail himself. I doubt a detailed description would have helped anyway as Puddle Duck stole the spotlight describing her recent exploits at Net-Ball. Apparently she had played competitively in school and had the most unique ability to shoot the ball with her chin. BrEW took the mandatory photo. There was some last minute dialog about who had torches and Madness stated that he told everyone torches might be a good idea. We were later to learn that “good idea” meant absolute must. Birdseye led the way uphill and sniffed out the route. We were off.

The start was overall rather uneventful. A check here. A check there. A couple of crafty dust placements saw Silent Running’s moment of glory die quickly as he bellowed “on, on – follow me – I have found the way”, only to be called back by the pack heading in the opposite direction. This was the last clear event I can recall because as the pack crossed the field and entered the woods, afterwards to be known as the land of darkness, things became more than a little confusing. Our hare had been a busy little bee and every check we came upon provided us with multiple options. Strider was kind enough to check more than his share, but even youthful enthusiasm was no match for this course. As the hounds kept returning from the obvious routes with down turned faces and the phrase “false trail” hanging from their lips it became apparent that the most unlikely route had been choose by our hare. These routes were always up hill, overgrown with vegetation and full of thorns. The only saving grace was the absence of large free-standing bodies of water.

The pack was fairly spread out during the first half of the course, and a few carefully chosen stops provided an opportunity for all to close the gaps and grab a needed breather. A particularly long leg uphill ended with a whip-in on a rise at the edge of the wood line. This was a positive turn as it meant we were leaving the woods which were becoming darker and darker as the evening drew on. The smiles on the faces of Jibber and Kinky Bugger gave away their hope that this might be the turning point for the start to the pub. Madness told us that it was all down hill from here. Again we set off. A rider on horseback was kind enough to point out the pedestrian trial and we believed our luck was changing. The pack continued downhill for quite a ways and while no expert navigator it was hard to shake the feeling that we were not heading in the direction of the pub. Truer words had never been spoken for what goes down must go up if it wants to get home, and our hare had made this painfully obvious. So after what amounted to a forced march up hill because it was far too steep and over-grown with thorns to run we emerged again at the edge of the woods.

It had become much darker now and this was only amplified by the thickness of the forest canopy. The fact that we only possessed three torches among us began to prove problematic although it was easy to identify Silent Running from the whining of his hand generated light. Our hare brought up the rear constantly counting heads to make sure we had not left anyone. A very scary thought because he kept counting 12 including himself and there were 13 of us. In the end it was so dark no one was able to see the trail let alone any dust marking the way. Luckily our hare’s need for a pint of bitter got the better of him and he graciously pointed out the trail to the pub.

Overall an excellent run even if we couldn’t really see the last 2 miles of it.

Hare(s): Madness

Hounds: Birdseye, BrEW, Jibber, Kinky Bugger, Puddle Duck, Quelque Chose, Silent Running, Sloe, Strider, Walt and Stan

Social Hounds/Puppy Hashers: None

Real Hounds: Trip


Price: Madness       # 448