Photos by Hugs 

Photos by Cathusalem 

Write-up by Hugs

Write-up by Cathusalem

I'd been looking forward to it because Hugs had written to me during the week to tell me he'd got an easy 2.5km loop lined up for me. He would walk with me for 1km then I could follow paper home. Sounded good, the trail photos looked nice and I thought it would be good to have company for 1km because I'm nearly always by myself these days because I'm so slow. 

However, it didn't quite work out like that. Possibly the delayed start caused by FRB phoning in to say he needed to change a wheel but hadn't got a wheel brace might have had something to do with it. Mudman supplied the wheel brace and Hugs got it to FRB because Mudman's truck was hemmed in by ice boxes by this time. 

We set off about 15 minutes late with Smelly Fingers joining Hugs and me. I kept up quite well at first. Then Hugs told me there was an ideal spot where I could take photos of everybody as they passed by. My reply was that I'd prefer to take photos back at the car park where I could have a beer. Maybe I did slow down but kept calling "Are you?" until Hugs's "On On" reply was so far distant I decided going back was my best option even though Hugs had lead Smelly Fingers and me on a route with no paper whatsoever.

I decided to go East to try to pick up the out trail rather than North where I might finish up in the quarry we'd skirted going South. Within five minutes, I found paper and a broken check which I've now identified was #7 and soon after that a bunch of runners told me to be careful because it was a very long runners trail I was going backwards on. 

Undeterred, I carried on Eastward diverting off paper when the trail turned South and then soon found it again because it had looped back. After that it was an easy route home following paper on the left. I've concluded that the bunch of runners must have missed the merge sign and thought they were still on the runners loop...perhaps they missed it because they were racing to try to catch FRB.

It was an easy route home for me but not uninteresting. There was a large herd of goats and the attractive goatherd lady asked me where I was going. She told me the goats and the buffaloes were all hers and spoke very good English.

On to the down-downs: for the Hares, Hugs and Cute Comer, returners Smelly Fingers, Slime and Lucky Me, visitor No Name Charles, scribe Penny Lame. Then, the most important event was for Bruised Willy to bestow Hugs with the Hash Shit for services to trail laying. Read all about it in Hugs's own write-up. 

On On,

Cathusalem

Trail scan and notes by Tinks