Sangre Grande

This was the Rincon Waterfalls trail, with a robust climb . . . Where to begin??? After yesterday’s experience on trail #1, the past 12 days of straight hash trails including the prelube cruise, and being quarantined in Qatar for 7 days with COVID just 3 weeks ago, I was feeling pretty sluggish this morning. As we were leaving the parking lot at the start, Likk’mm said something to me about catching up with the runners, and I uttered seven words that have rarely ever (almost never) come out of my mouth . . . “Nope, I'm doing the walking trail today.” <insert those famous string of quotes from Lloyd Bridges in the Movie AIRPLANE> . . . https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lm8fYf53SMg

That would be the beginning of a series of events of my own creation, and being a victim of circumstance. It was dry all morning, unlike the previous few days, but just as we circled up for chalk talk . . . the rain started. Not a lot, but enough to turn trail into a slippery mess, which we would not find out until a ways up the mountain. Anyway, after the start and walking for about 5 minutes, and seeing the FRBs and front of the pack disappearing around the bend, I figured I would just run a little bit to stay in contact, but the damage was already done. As the trail snaked its way through the jungle, and onto some of those single file tracks, I ended up behind some slower runners and got way behind. But I was still planning to hit the walker’s cutoff and work my way back down the mountain.

Although we passed several hares on trail, none of them mentioned that they were the split point. They just kept pointing us in the direction of trail. When we hit the part marked with yellow caution tape, where the instructions were that that was the point of split, there was no indication to go another way. I was with 4 or 5 other hashers at this point, and we just kept going up the stream, and then climbing. After another 20-30 minutes we come up to yet another hare, so I ask is this the split? He said no, this is the waterfalls . . . Ughhh. I mentioned that there were a few other walker’s still trudging their way up the mountain thinking there was a split . . . so the hare then went back down trail to gather them up and turn them all around. Guess I did the runner’s trail after all today.

By this time I am double dog tired, but after a 15 minute rest I stepped off with a bold . . . 10 steps and hit the bottom of yet another incredible climb. There were about 10 hashers hanging out at the waterfalls, and they soon passed me, making me the DFL. I hated the feeling, but there was nothing I could do about it other than hope I didn’t die on trail, and leaving my body for others to carry down the mountain. 😊 After what seemed like an eternity, I finally made it to the ridge, where the hares claimed . . . “It’s all downhill from here” . . . which was mostly true. That is when it really started to pour down, and as we would find out later, the start of the flash flood.

It was Doctor Bomb Bay and I, and one hare, making our way down the mountain. 2 miles later, we finally see the busses and the finish . . . but this is where the flash flood became an issue. There was a stream crossing right at the finish, and the entire pack had easily made it across. But when we got there, the stream had risen to probably 5 feet deep and was flowing very fast. After several attempts to find a way across, including throwing a rope over, it was useless. We reviewed our options, and our hare finally decided that we should follow the out trail back towards the start (of this A to B trail).

Having already completed over 7 miles, the thought of slogging back another couple miles along the trail was not blowing any air up my skirt, but we all stepped off and headed that way. Our hare managed to recognize a shortcut, and we hit the main road in just 1.5 miles, making our day’s excursion into excellence just under 9 miles and just over 4 hours. We then got picked up and driven back to where the other hares were waiting, the busses had already taken the pack to the On On On. We then moved to another location to meet up with other hares, only to find out there was a flat tire. We waited for that for a bit, then we waited for another hare to change clothes, then to collect her glasses . . . THEN, we finally headed out to join the rest of the pack. WHAT A @#$!!#$@ day it was. I’ll be going back to sniffing glue (running trail) again, like Lloyd Bridges. Fortunately, the pack was happy to see us, or maybe just relieved that we were not dead. 😊

After downing a couple beers and a bottle of water, I was feeling almost human again. So the hares said we should get circle going, and that capped off an amazing day. I really want to “again” thank all the hares for taking the time out of their already busy lives, to set trails for all the visitors of OUTERHASH this week. We certainly could not have all this fun without their effort. Circle was great, we gave the hares their customary down downs, we had a birthday cake, recognized a few heinous trail crimes, and drank lots of beers, before getting back on the busses for the hour ride back to town. Tomorrow is another day, and trail will be the Red Dress Run in town, so no chance getting stuck on the mountain . . . End of story.Okumaya devam et