The pollution puts some of us off, so Itchy chose to pick a run site about 20 metres from a fire… We all considered peeing on it, but even before we set off running the lungs were clouded with smoke.
It was an interesting run site – almost missable, except for 3 large “A” signs on the ground. We knew the area, as we’d run past it before, but I don’t recall a runsite there. A brief harebrief and we set off between two lakes. Quite a way to the first circle, and Brown Finger generously let me check the correct way. Another circle and I was heading up the hill… Brownie of course caught me (following me at an obvious check), and we ran into a circle on the ridge together. My bet was the trail down to the right, but I didn’t have enough confidence, so chose the higher ground up the hill. Brownie chose another hill, and when we came back Chuckie was calling the trail I originally wanted.
Down the hill and a random circle check on the trail guarded with barbed wire. Where to go? We carried on and found a gap in the fence. Brownie spotted powder down below, so we opted to throw ourselves off and work our way down. When we got there we called, and the pack came following, not having found a better route by then. Brownie, Chuckie and I were ahead and confidently checked the same way at the next circle. We were wrong, but what made it worse was when we were wrong a second time, and Graven came steaming through to take the lead.
It seems we cut off a couple of km and ended up near the A site sooner than expected. Nobody was overly concerned, it was freaking hot and we were glad to finish when we did. Great trail Itchy!