2014-03-04 -12 131

Location

In a park near Humpty Doo.

Participants

Felix Dance
Toni
Declan

Expedition

Virgin Hash!

I discovered the hash to be quite accessible today. Instead of both going to Trivia and going to squash I decided to make a hash of it. Recruiting Declan, my Irish workmate who usually joins me at squash, I rode over to his place and we headed out towards the hash on the hot, humid night in Darwin. Declan was keen to try out his new bike so didn't take much convincing.

Along the way we randomly bumped into Declan's girlfriend Toni who had just finished her shift at the Vetinary Clinic in Parap. Excited by our adventure (although not bothering to hear about all the gory details) she elected to come along.

After the sun set, we rode through the night along the old rail trail towards Palmerston and the hash - a similar route to my virgin hash to the Darwin graticule.

Toni only had a vintage girl's bike with clickety-clacks and a pig light. I used my ultra-high-beam to light the way. Despite this she did a tremendous job on the 65 or so Ks.

Out past Palmerston, the track suddenly turned to unridable sand and the others seemed dubious as to where I was taking them (and why??!!). After a couple of Ks, sand-riding and fording the odd stream, we popped out at a housing estate. Toni and Declan decided to hang out at the petrol station there while I launched for the hash proper due to a lack of lights and the business of the Stuart Highway.

Riding to smaller and smaller streets until I'd jumped a ditch and traversed a bush-single-track, I at last got off my bike and bush-based the final 50m to the hash, avoiding spiders and using my bike as a battering ram to crush the tall grass in front of me. So you don't have to skip to the end here I did NOT get eaten by a crocodile. My phone ran out of batteries just as I took the final shot proving I was there.

Hash achieved to within a hundredth of an arc second, I quickly returned to the others. A night of accidental highway riding got us home (and me to MacDonalds). I got to bed some time after 11pm, which made the 4:30am start Declan I do for work particularly unpleasant the next morning!

Here is the route that was taken.