Friday, June 24
We knew it was going to be a good day as soon as we ordered our first beer immediately after breakfast. No guilt here as it was about 5 o’clock somewhere in Europe. Everyone knows that nothing says good morning like a stiff cold one.
The rest of the motley crew started to arrive at about 10 am, and right off the bat one could tell that they were ready to turn their brain cells to mush, marinate their livers and maim their bodies to a pulp. As planned, a delicious lunch was organized for the ravenous pack, who descended like a horde of locusts on the buffet, and before you could say 'Emeril Lagasse' devoured everything on display leaving non-hashing guests wondering who the hell are these people and why are they so starved.
Oblivious of the epic and perilous journey that awaited them, and of the torture that lay ahead, after lunch the pack stood milling around innocently, bewildered by the cool design of the Pub Crawl t-shirt smuggled by the MMC from Central America. After a useless chalk-talk no one paid attention to, "Snake Charmer" blessed the hares, "Driving Miss Daisy" and "Happy Hooker", and in an attempt to stimulate the flock he declared that the run ahead was a ´Mickey Mouse Run´, and that there was nothing to fear. Unaware that the Hares had something very evil in mind, he added that this was going to be 'a quick stroll through some absolutely lovely, verdantly green, rolling hills and quiet meadows near the hotel'. Judging by the number of ass-on-trail, wounded knees, cuts, scrapes, assorted bruises, and the amount of blood that was being spilled on the trail, it soon became clear that "Snake Charmer" was hallucinating.
The hounds set off and were quickly confused by a couple of skillfully marked falses set around the various natural pools of the hotel. Hashers became even more dissoriented when "U-Done-It" trying to show his taliban-hunting skills, led the group in a loop back to the same location where we started. We turned around and walked to the last check, true trail was somehow stumbled upon and we started climbing. Misleadingly, the uphill trek seemed awfully short, but it was a very steep incline and all we had to hang on to were weeds with thorns, broken rocks or dig our dainty fingers into the ground. Up and up we climbed, and finally at the summit, after passing through a tight little cavern, we were treated to a spectacular overlook of the Samaná Peninsula.
Going down the hill was even more challenging than climbing up. Unfortunately not all of us did it with style and grace. The first one to take a tumble was Sandy Tredford. I can´t remember how many times she bounced but when she finally stopped falling, she was flat on her ass. Surprisingly, she was giggling. Then came "Bigger than Mine" sliding down the hill, on his ass and feet first, faster than the Tokyo bullet train. There were other 3 or 4 more hashers who lost their footing and paid the price, but the record-breaking slide, the Mother of all Tumbles belongs to "Virgin Whore". She managed not only to slide about 15 meters down the hill, and cut her legs and arms, but also almost pulled her finger out its socket when her wedding ring got stuck in a branch. She tried the classic maneuver of slowing her decent by clawing at the ground and grabbing anything that came her way. Big mistake. Lots of blood and pain.
We finally descended to a more hospitable terrain, and solaced our wretchedness at a little river that provided much needed cool down. And so, after about an hour of flesh rending thorns, scratchy tall grass and ankle-wrenching boulders, we arrived at the promised land: the Beer Check, where "Xilakaga" duly nourished everyone, and where "Virgin Whore" received proper medical attention administered by "Legally Blonde" and "Estrechita". She was doused with Neosporin, and intravenously rehydrated with beer for she was becoming delirious from lack of alcohol. The nightmare's section of the trail was over. From here it was a limping, bleeding, sore walk to the hotel, where our sadistic hares were waiting. Nobody cared anymore about what laid ahead, the trail was well-worth the pain and sacrifice, the bastards knew what they were doing.
The tired and barely-alive hashers made it to the Circle of Depravity, where all kinds of transgressions and crimes, real and imaginary, were severely punished, and many thirsts were quenched. "Virgin Whore" was duly chastised for being clumsy and almost killing herself, which would´ve ruined the AGPU. French virgin Vivianne Kieffer was welcomed in true Hash tradition, which means she was introduced and subjected to various forms of embarrassment. Sandy Tedford was baptised with great fanfare, and she is now known as "Rigor Mortis". "U-Done-It" was poured a beer for travelling almost 2 days to return to the scene of the crime, and for looking tired and completely exhausted like a neutered cat. Tears of sadness were stifled back as we learned that "Bigger than Mine" and "Xilakaga" will go back to Alabama, hopefully to take up economically rewarding productive lives of virtue and honour. We said 'Sayonara' to them with a massive down down they will likely not forget. Lots of other sinners were punished. Too many to remember. Swing Low crowned the event, after which I was whisked away by "Legally Blonde" to get hosed off and sober up before dinner. The pack continued to sing and dance and drink more beer for some time, and from my drunken point of view a great time was had by all. A Dominican Night followed for all the survivors, and we were treated to a fantastic buffet. "Palos" or "Atabales" were later played around a large bonfire, while hashers were dancing like lunatics, freely and with abandon...
What a glorious day it was for a run, and what a great Hash !!
The venue for this year AGPU was an ecological retreat called