After 27 days of travelling, I finally got home last night. I’m pretty tired – the Hash Inter-Am was too much fun!
So, let’s get to it. I’m going to back track a little bit since now my photos are uploaded.
Jack, Marsha, and I drove back to the bay area from Truckee, and made a lunch stop in Davis, CA. Last time I was there (that I can recall), it was my 21st birthday, I went on a bar crawl, and got really drunk. This time I remained sober, and managed to find some great street art!
Hard to tell but this arch is made out of old shovels!
Big dog and cat statues made from recycled stuff
The Dumpling House (great dumplings, and they also serve “London Fish and Chips”)
Anyway, we decided to drive back via I-80, so I got to drive over the new section of the Bay Bridge.
It’s pretty cool – on this trip I drove on the Golden Gate Bridge, the Bay Bridge, the San Mateo Bridge and the Carquinez Strait bridge. I haven’t done that in years!
And, as I said in my previous post, I had a nice stay at a Hilton in Burlingame. Here is the view from my window – I was facing Coyote Point.
Then it was off to Phoenix for the Inter-Americas Hash. It was an incredible, fun time, but like Las Vegas, “what happens at Inter-Am stays at Inter-Am.” But here are a few photos anyway:
Squaw Peak Hilton Resort
Day One by the pool
Trail on Friday – climbing up the hill behind the resort
Trail on Saturday – around Tempe:
Kenn enjoyed trail! This view overlooks downtown Tempe
Trail on Sunday – Black Canyon:
Watch Out Kenn!
Lovely.
Note that ‘ON ON’ is spelled with spent shotgun casings! There was a lot of them.
The Black Canyon Trail was particularly exciting. We were on trail and could hear a lot of gunfire (hence the spent shells and target photos). As we proceeded, it got louder, and sounded closer. I was feeling pretty uncomfortable about it. Then, a bunch of the hashers came back and said we had to veer off of trail because the FRB (Front Running Bastard) almost got shot – he heard the bullet whizz by his head! Thank God he didn’t get shot! Somehow we communicated with the shooters (who apparently were shooting at targets in the hills, with BIG guns) that a running group was coming through, so they held their fire while we ran past.
The rest of the trail was beautiful out in the desert. Until we were at our last beer stop, and found out our bus was stuck!
There was a tow truck there when we got back to the bus. The bus driver had backed the bus up to turn it around, and wedged it into a mound of sand. The back wheels were on loose gravel and couldn’t get traction. The tow truck by itself couldn’t budge the bus. So, one of the hashers, who had a big pickup truck, attached itself also, so both the tow truck and the pickup truck tried pulling it out. Nope! Then about 15 hashers got behind the bus and tried pushing with the two trucks pulling. Nope!
Luckily, a replacement bus was there so that’s how we got back to the resort. But for all I know that bus is still stuck out there!
There were dances and parties at night, and the last ‘official’ morning we were there, we went on the aptly named Hangover Hash. It was longer than most of us thought, but the beer stop was in a nice park.
The next day it was time to go home, 27 days after I left. It has been an epic trip. So, Kenn and I had to celebrate the trip with a yummy Bloody Mary at the airport:
I’ll end this post talking about the wildfires in California. I drove through that same area two weeks ago. I stayed in Calistoga and by the looks of the wildfire maps, Calistoga is right in the thick of the fires. I hope the hotel that I stayed at survives – I really enjoyed my time there.
Next post will be a summary of my trip – dates, routes, hotels. I’m kind of curious to see all of my trip info in one place! Talk to you then!