From Pennies To Yennies

I hope everyone had a good weekend. We did!

One of the best parts about hashing is the variety of kennels, or chapters. Our kennel is a Friday night one in Tokyo, and most the time we stick to the Tokyo kennels. It’s really fun to check out other kennels though, see how they’re run, what’s similar and what’s different. So this Saturday Dan and I took a day trip to Ibaraki for a day with the Ibaraki Hash House Harriers (IH3).

I was glad we were going because a fellow hasher friend of ours was moving back to the UK, and this run was doubling as a farewell BBQ. We caught the Tsukuba Express from Akihabara, making total transit time just shy of 2 hours. Though all the locals know where the usual meet-up spot is, our friend was nice enough to run the 10 minutes out to the train station and chalked some arrows so we wouldn’t get lost!

We arrived to the meet up with no problem and got to know everyone. It wasn’t long til we were off! The first thing I realized is how hot it was. Dan and I normally run at night, so running on a warm day under the sun was a little rough.

About 2.5-3 miles in, the hare (the guy who laid the trail for us to run) set up a funny little drink stop for us runners.

Dan and I aren’t big drinkers in the first place, and especially when I’m dieting, but it was so hot that we split a cold one, and it felt amazing. We hung out and chatting with everyone in the shade for maybe 20 minutes, then got back on trail.

The beer gave me a bit of a sloshy belly, and paired with the beating sun, I wasn’t feeling like a picture-perfect athlete. Luckily a decent amount of the remainder of the run was through “shiggy”, or forested areas. Some of it was tough, but pretty!


Ran around lots of rice paddies. You don’t see that in Tokyo!

Dan making his way down a little hill

About 5.6 miles later (but who’s counting?) we finished and were rewarded with an awesome BBQ and mingled with new running friends. The party was still going when we left, but sadly we had to catch our train back to Tokyo.

Our group post run

We officially have a new Sunday tradition: hot yoga! Before class Dan and I went for a 3 mile run, then made our way to the gym. It was a good class, my only gripe was all the ballet-esque poses we did. Didn’t seem very yoga-like. Oh well.
The camera didn’t really capture it, but we were actively dripping with sweat!

That was our weekend! How was yours?