Square Rooter setting the run? Perhaps I could arrange a late afternoon meeting… No? Well, I guess I could give him another chance – Huay Tung Thao? There are some worrying hills around there, surely this would be different! We turned right at the entrance – promising, the East of the lake gives us at least 500m/1km of flat before we can hit the hills – oh how wrong I was as the A site loomed right at the base of the mountain. Ominous.
Well, too late to turn back now, lets see what he’s got in store. The hare brief wasn’t really a hare brief, it was more of a hare warning, with SR doing his best to talk us out of setting off. He suggested that everyone should turn back at the first available moment, and if you had a flashlight you should take it. He would even set off backwards to make sure we all made it – if the hare knows it’s deadly, perhaps we should just start drinking instead?
I set off conservatively, feeling the run from yesterday in my legs, and watched Belly Dancer head straight up the closest steep hill at the first check. Nope, the hare was more devious than that and we set off on a pleasant trail that seemed more down than up… I remarked to Brown Finger that perhaps SR was double crossing us – I’d not seen him that frantic about how bad the run was before, and you never know, maybe he’d set a good run! Foot in mouth, spoke too soon… – the trail headed up, and up, and up, and up…. The FRBs took off chasing Brown Finger who was getting every check right and sprinting up the hill, I cruised along with Turkish Delight (who was suffering from Turret’s syndrome). Near the top of one of the many hills we met Sloppy Rod who was trying to persuade us to turn back – when we didn’t he spent the next half hour or so telling us how we should be preparing to spend the night out in the jungle. “I scouted this with SR, we spent 4 hours with water, no way we will finish, he’s insane, we aren’t even half way up yet, do you have a flash light, we should go back, do you have a phone, this is a bad idea…”
I pushed on, trying to get away from SR’s negativity and TD’s abuse, unfortunately taking a fall that means my ribs are still hurting. We emerged from the jungle and found the beaming hare who’d dragged Superman back up the trail. It turned out there was a 2.5km On-In straight down a long trail, which would have been wonderfully runable had my ribs not been jarring every step. It seems like the FRBs enjoyed the run, so I guess I just need to get fitter! At least the circle was good, although Chang Beer should be banned, especially for use as Splash Beer – surely Leo is cheaper and at least drinkable!
(p.s. Sometimes SR refers to Square Rooter, and sometimes to Sloppy Rod, the reader can figure it out)