Divers explore crevices.

Most people at already headed for home, however due to the timing of the diving trip, we decided to spend an extra day in Perth. In the morning we hopped the train to Freemantle on the western coast to explore a bit. There was a street party/festival, so there was plenty of entertainment. We wandered as a group for a while and had lunch at a place called "Cicerello’s" for some great seafood before splitting off to do our own thing. I spent my afternoon goring through the Maritime Museum at check out the shipwreck history of the area. It held the recovered remains of a fairly famous (for the area) ship called Batavia. We were suppose to meet at 6pm, however apparently everyone else got tired and decided to leave early. We go back to the hotel, cleaned up, and packed to head to the airport for our over-night flight to Cairns.

going down in an elevator, going down-down with the hash

When we got to the venue Sunday morning, there were notes everywhere stating that nudity was not allowed and if witnessed by park staff, taps would be turned off and would not resume for the rest of the day. Apparently people are finding that hashers and the general public don't mix and this is probably something that should have been covered when the organizers first approached the venue. Sunday is the last full day of the Interhash and last day of trails. today we decided to do one of the beach hashes as we heard good things about the end location and circle on the beach. Trail was OK with a fair mix of urban and suburban running and started at the Mt. Flora Lookout in Stirling. The trail ended at a small park by the beach and the circle was a lot of fun with various accusations and humor (but still no songs). I was able to take a swim in the Indian Ocean. After we were done we headed back to the venue to party a bit more. There was more food and beer (of course) along with street entertainment and a fireworks conclusion. There was talk about doing an 11:50 PM nude hash run to spite the listed rules, however after a long weekend, people were exhausted and it got a little chilly the last evening, so nothing really happened.

After the venue shut down, several of us were heading to a room party. When we got to the hotel elevator, several of us piled inside including myself, Mams, Dr. PP, MataHari, some Japanese tag-along, a security guard, and a few others. Apparently there were too many of us as the elevator actually got stuck between floors. We could open the elevator cab doors, but not the doors for the next floor. I tried for a while to figure out the mechanisms, but it was in vain and the hotel had to call out a technician at 1 o'clock in the morning to get us out. Sparerib tried to help us out by sticking a Camelbak full of ..umm.. water, so that that was helpful. Mams and I both had water bottles in our hands but when someone asked for a drink we advised them that it probably wasn't the best idea as it was very, potent water (about 40 proof). After about 90 minutes of waiting the tech finally arrived and was able to free us. It was all part of the adventure I suppose.

Confucius Say; Man with hand in bush not necessarily trimming shrubs.

Today was the first of the hash runs where dozens of buses took people to various locations around Perth for trail. In the rego papers there were descriptions of the run, however a few of us mainly chose the trail based on who was running circle. Mams, Hummingbird, me, and a few others loaded up for one of the bush runs. We were dropped off near some national park and then had a long trail to the end that was over several large hills, across rivers, and through pretty much what anyone would consider heavy bush. It was relatively well marked until the end where many of us got lost until we found marks of another trail. The circle was fun (except for the lack of any singing) with plenty of food, drink, and down-downs to go around.

A lot of the hashs in the area are men-only and B.A.T.T. overheard one of the trail runners about he hopes there are none of 'those women' on the next trail, even though she came in before he did, so she called him out for down-downs much to his embarrassment. Back at the venue a few hours later she's telling the story to some friends about some asshole that was making snide remarks about women and guess who just happened to be walking past. Small world sometimes; too small. At the venue there was another evening of skits, drink, and food.

Is Australia really down under, or are we upside down?

This morning I decided to sign up for one of the 'pre-lewd' hash runs with the local Hammersley Hash House Harriers that is a male-only (save for visitors) hash and is pretty well know in the world hash community. This is such a large hash that they have not only their own beer trailer, but also a habdasher trailer and even a shuttle bus for use in transporting runner. The trail was great (for a pre-lay) as it went through a lot of the major areas of downtown Perth including the lovely Swan Bell Tower, waterfront, and parks. I hadn't pre-signed up for the run, so I didn't get any of the gimmies as they had run out, but still had a good time. The trail ended across the river from the main venue and at least one hasher decided to swim the entire thing (brave considering boat traffic) but was exhausted enough that he passed out in circle, poor bloke. The end circle was fun in the park as there was plenty of beer and food except for one thing. The hash seemed to know one, and only one song. Every down-down had the same exact song, no variation at all. I can understand in some cases where you have such a large circle (typically several dozen on their normals runs) and need to keep control and not have everyone shout out a song, but at least switch it up sometimes. The RAs did a great job and kept things moving with a lot of humor. I have also learned that the Brits, Aussie, Americans, and Kiwis are merely separated by a common language.

On the way back to the hotel I passed another hash circle, this time done by a bunch of Irish and they definitely had the singing going on! As I wandered around I talked to various hashers and learned how much of a small world it can be at time. I met Some Dumb chick that knew several of my friends in La and San Diego, Up chuck from Las Vegas that knew Multiple Horsegasm, and even ran into Rub Her Buns and Ganja Man whom I had known from previous hash cruises and events and meat crash Test Dildo and Hummer from Jacksonville (now stationed in Sydney).

Back at the venue there were the first skits of the weekends along with the bid presenters for 2010s Interhash events. This was where all those trying to get votes for the next IWH would make a presentation. There was even a presentation from the Baghdad Hash as they offered such unique aspects of a daily fireworks show, Kevlar goodie bag, and top 10 reasons why it should be there. They did end getting seven votes, however they had more members than that on heir bid committee! Others to make a bid were Malaysia, Bali, and Kenya (who I really wanted to win), however Borneo (who had a good presentation video) was finally voted in by Sunday afternoon as the winner. Brussels also put in a pre-bid for IWH 2014 as well. Through the event there were plenty of street performers to entertain the crowd before the evening festivities started. The skits involved all kinds of different shows and 'talent's displayed with requisite appearances by the like of Crocodile Dundee and other Aussie characters. Perth hashers did a hash rendition of the 'land down under' song ("Interhash in Perth down under, down-down-down under, can you hear the aussie thunder?") The MC was some aussie character named Dame Edna whom was somewhat entertaining, but the skits were in all pretty good. Skite: Rocky city H3 did 'thank god for the interhash' song/dance skit, Perth Hariettes "dildos are a girls best friend", Guam "pussy control", etc

For whatever reason, the organizers had scheduled the event to fall on Good Friday, which by Australian law mean all alcohol dispensing had to cease by 10 o'clock, not the best if plans when hashers are involved. While walking out later, we noticed the party still going quite strong in one of the dance areas. Apparently the bar staff at the venue simply closed the cages to the bottles and went home since we had the venue until midnight. When they left, however, they failed to turn off the taps and it didn't take long for the hashers to figure it out. In classic hash fashion, drinks were being passed out my new volunteer hash staff until the kegs ran dry. after the venue closed the rest of us went to various party rooms until the wee hours of the morning.

Confucius say: Early worm has death wish

We had an early wake up since Hot Dick was driving us to the airport but had to make a bunch of stops along the way for hist airport shuttle route. Traffic sucked and we we had relatively little time to spare before our departure. however fortunately airport security there doesn't make one do asinine stuff such as dump the dangerous liquids or remove shoes. When we got to Perth we shared a cab ride into town with some other hashers and saw a lot of those on the red dress run trail pass by. I'm glad we didn't sign up for that event as from what I understand it was a huge cluster with food and drink being quite scarce. After checking into the hotel we headed to the venue walked around a bit. It was nice to quickly run into a several of the people I knew; Fill Me Up, PS Knave, Two Nice Tits, B.A.T.T., Dick the Boy Wonder, etc. I of course quickly ran into many of the people with whom I'd spent the last week.

The venue itself seemed like it would work. Gloucester Park was a large racing track form some kind of chariot horse races, however one bad thing was that it was open to the public during the day. It usually isn't a good thing to mic hashers with the public. After all the RDR runners had gotten in the food and drinks were served while the typical day races were conducted. A small car with long gate arms on either side would start the warm-up pace around the track and then close the arms and move to the side upon the official start. There was lot of talk of doing a hash race along the track and somehow it all started. The track officials even allowed the use of the pace vehicle. It was funny to watch the dozens of participants, though I think most did not fully anticipate the length of the track (probably a little less than a mile). We hung around for a few more hours and shut down the place before grabbing some Thai for dinner, hitting the liquor store, and catching up on rest to prepare for the long weekend ahead.

Conclusion: The point when you get tired of thinking.

With a heavy heart (and even heavier head), we all got up to pack and load up the bus for the final trip to take everyone to the airport. Doing her final count Dr. PP asked if we had everyone and was met by mummers of "whatever.. lets go". Sparerib was always making up songs and was a songmeister most of the trip and even penned on for me:

"How about some bondage Mrs. Murphy,
it quite excites me to be bound.
I have straps that are leather, silk, and furry
You can tie me up,
but please don't Tie Me Down-down-down-down"

Mams had arranged for us to stay with some of her old hasher friends in Brisbane, so the bus dropped us off to be picked up and taken to hot dick / Icebox's place. We took out Hot Dick's boat for a full afternoon of cruising on the river and did our own floating pub crawl followed by a great dinner at their home of steak kabobs, lobster, kangaroo sausage while relaxing on the patio. I was up relatively late using the computer to back up my picture files, deal with e-mails, and research some things for the New Zealand trip.

Here are the web links for the photo album from the bus tour. Many of the pictures are geotagged, so if you click the link in the caption you should be taken to a satellite photo that shows exactly where the picture was taken.:

http://picasaweb.google.com/mblitch/BrisbaneBusTourAlbum1
http://picasaweb.google.com/mblitch/BrisbaneWebAlbum2

Darkness reigns at the foot of the lighthouse

We were out pretty late last night and slept in a bit since this was a scheduled free day when there were not any particular plans for the morning or afternoon. I was up about 9:40 to head to the dive shops to try to get in on a trip since I wanted to do a little bit of diving. I found that Dive Byron Bay had space on the next trip and just had time to sign in and get my gear together. We rode a jeep to the beach and assisted in launching the boat before wading to deeper water and piling in. We rode out to the Julian Rocks, visible as being in the middle of the bay, and tied into one of several mooring buoys. The water was cool, but comfortable enough as we swam around checking out the leopard sharks, wobbegong sharks, urchins, and other creatures. Unfortunately, the dive guide was really quite unskilled as he was constantly kicking up the bottom and every time he stopped he would instantly go vertical and stand on the bottom. Most divers are never really trained that this is a bad, sloppy practice so they simply don't pay attention. I did see a diver that seemed to know what he was doing and had great form underwater and found out later that he was a technically trained diver out of Sydney, so it figures. After we got back I spent an hour or so in the Internet cafe to pay bills, check e-mail, etc and make a call home, though Kristen could not hear me (the staff at the shop had no clue about computers and claimed there was a 'Firefox' virus that was causing issues), so we ended up talking through Gmail chat.

In the evening we had a most excellent trail set by Rumple from the top of Byron Bay by the lighthouse (they had arranged for a van to pick us up from the hotel and take us to the start) all the way down back into town. We had a great circle on the RR tracks behind the hotel to end the week as this was unfortunately out last hash as a bus group. The bus driver was even named something along the lines of 'roller coaster driver', but I cannot remember the full name. The last group event was to burn off the rest of the food and as much as the drink as possible before we all had to fly to Perth in the following days. It was great to get to meet and learn about so many good folks; especially Dr. PP, Mr. X, SpareRib, Rumple, Hummingbird, Walkabout, Python, Rubberchoak, Mams, and Yarksucker. A lot of time and effort was put into this and it really showed by how smooth things ran and how much of a good time was had by everyone.