Hash Run

So this past weekend I went on this event called a Hash run and it was a blast! These runs are actually held all over the world. It is a completely cross-country run through unique terrain. Basically by going on it, you see really unique areas of Taiwan that you wouldn't otherwise get to see, like farmers planting in their fields and tiny villages.
I went with my 2 roommates Katelin and Kenzie and we met the group at an MRT station in Taipei. Then we all boarded a chartered bus and it drove us north near the coast. The start of the run was at the top of some hills, so the bus started to make it's way up. Then the road did a complete U-turn going uphill and the bus wasn't going to make it. So this massive bus with about 50 people on it started to do a 6-point turn on this steep curve, getting perilously close to the edge each time it backed up....about 5 minutes later we somehow got all the way turned around and continued upwards! Amazing - it felt like the ending to the original 'Italian Job.' The bus couldn't make it all the way, so we walked the last 5 minutes or so. Then we started!

The trail is about an hour or so long (depending on how fast you run or walk, and what the route is like.) There are the 'hares' who pick the route (they go in advance and choose the route, sometimes clearing away the bamboo or other vegetation with machetes...) and leave the start line about 5 minutes earlier than everyone else to mark the trail with blobs of flour. Then the girls start and the guys go about 10 minutes later.

This particular one was amazing because it was all downhill and through really cool areas - through rice fields and little villages with people sitting on their balconies cheering us on, overgrown creeks, thick bamboo stands, irrigation ditches and tunnels where you had to grab onto a banana plant to keep from falling when you emerged on the other side, along the edges of crops (one in particular had a farmer shouting Chinese at us...) then eventually about an hour later we ended up on the beach!

It's a new course each week in a different location and the trail is supposed to be difficult to find in parts, so you really have to keep an eye out for white patches of flour while navigating down steep rocky areas and creeks. My legs got fairly scratched from running through the low down vines and pushing aside the branches and twigs, but definitely worth it!
Afterwards we met the bus at the bottom of the hill, right next to the beach where we all dove in (and surprisingly the water was extremely warm! This coming from someone who normally gets blue-lipped in the ocean...) Then we moved further on down the beach to a traditional Taiwanese restaurant specializing in barbeque. It is different from western barbeque in that each outdoor picnic table has it's own hot plate/grill, and you just choose whichever raw meat you want to cook and bring it back to your table. It was all you can eat and drink, so everyone definitely got their fill!

It was a great way to spend a Sunday and an even better way to see parts of Northern Taiwan that would be hard to get to otherwise. Everything is planned by the organizers so all you do is show up at the right time and place and off you go!