The Hash House Harriers in Chiang Mai almost always does their runs in jungle territory because cement is boring. Some of our contemporaries such as the Hash that exists in Bangkok, Thailand have no choice but to do urban runs but that is what make Chiang Mai so special.
There is also a wonderful opportunity to get hopelessly lost if you don't stick with the pack and remain on trail so it is kind of important that you do so. When we head out with 20-40 people at the start we don't normally have any sort of way of ensuring that you actually do make it back and while a lot of people bring their phones with them in case of an emergency, there have been instances where people have somehow wandered off trail and gotten lost badly. There was one instance and one only, that we had to call in the jungle search and rescue team because some numb-nuts went off trail and instead of turning back, just kept going in the wrong direction.
This can be a very bad thing when you consider that Chiang Mai is basically surrounded by hundreds of miles of national park and if you go to far, you wont be able to hear us when we go a shouting for you. We don't exactly have a great deal of safety standards put in place so a good rule of thumb if you aren't familiar with how these runs work, is to just stick with the pack. Normally, there will always be a group of lads that walks the entire trail and they all stick together. Some of the people in this group will be some of our most weathered expert veterans and they are not going to get lost and chances are, they have been doing this so long that they already know several methods of getting back to the start point unassisted. Also, since they walk they probably have a phone with GPS on it with them anyway.
There are some easy rules to follow though in the event that you do find yourself separated from the pack.
Our bits of paper aren't always this ornate as this was for a special event celebrating our 1500th run in Chiang Mai, but the system is similar even when we don't print something out special. The little scraps of paper on the top will be attached to trees or plants along the true path that indicate to you that you are still heading in the right direction. It is the obligation of the Hares (the people who made the trail) to explain to you how frequently they put these pieces of paper up. Normally it will be once every 100-200 meters and this is merely meant to reassure you that you are still on the correct trail. A good rule of thumb is to just keep going forward because any time there is any sort of crossroads there will be a piece of paper indicating what way you are supposed to carry on in.
One thing that you DEFINITELY need to keep an eye out for is this bad boy
"FT", whether it is on a piece of paper or written on the ground in flour, indicates that you are on a "False Trail" meaning that you need to turn around and go back to the last intersection where you veered off towards the FT in the first place, and then carry on in that direction. These are fun little things we do every now and then to get the Front Running Bastards (FRB's) to not be so far ahead of the rest of the pack. It is for fun and also to slow down the few athletes that we have in our midst from making the old fellas feel bad about their fitness.
If you carry on in the direction of a False Trail you are going to have a bad time because once the FT happens, there will be no more indicators of which direction you are supposed to go... because you were supposed to turn around.
Normally, if someone is new we will go out of our way to make sure that they don't wander off like a noob and end up trapped in the jungle but it has happened before and it was kind of scary. It's a very big place these national parks and if rescue has to get involved, it kind of reflects badly on all of us. Because of that one instance we still do fundraisers for that organization every year as a thank you and a sorry.
I feel as though you have to be pretty thick-headed to get lost at a Hash event but then again, we don't claim to be the smartest lot in the world either.
If you don't know what you are doing, stick to the trail and don't try to be a hero.
ON On!
