By Lucy Hawthorne.
I didn’t expect to set another metrogaine so soon after the 2021 Lenah Valley Hop. But every time I went for a walk, my now well-trained setter’s eyes would see a new boulder, a novelty letter box, or some graffiti that I desperately wanted to share with others. So when Gary said that he’d like another metrogaine on the 2024 calendar at last year’s AGM, I volunteered without a second thought. And so the Lenah Valley Hops Again (LVHA) was born.
I didn’t want a rerun of 2021, so I excluded all LVH1.0 checkpoints. Given the number of South Hobart hash houses we’ve had in recent years, I also tried to exclude those checkpoints too. Gone was Noah’s waterhole – one of my favourite checkpoints. Instead, I used the nearest possible humanmade object – an old rusty signpost – which caused less-experienced map readers some grief.
Given most LVH1.0 entrants headed south, looping around Knocklofty and Golden Gully, I decided to shift the LVHA map a little bit north, revealing more of Glenorchy and Tolosa Park, including Chapel Falls and the late Tony Woodward’s wonderful “Frida’s Carload” sculpture outside Moonah Arts Centre. Checkpoint counts revealed that this shift successfully lured people north, with a significant number of teams visiting the terrific view at 100 (the single bench in West Moonah). Checkpoint 90, outside the Lady Franklin Gallery, was the most popular checkpoint. Checkpoint 86 – a public artwork on the South Hobart rivulet - was the least visited (a mere 12 teams).
I was asked by one entrant after the event if the checkpoint numbering was random. Far from it. Every quarter was designed to be more or less equal (where possible), and every 16th similarly so. Challenging or notable checkpoints (such as a location with good views, or a kitsch koala letterbox) were given high scores as lures. But checkpoint placement was also used to influence routes and keep people from straying into private property, for instance.
Course setters always fret about checkpoints moving or disappearing before the event. One of the vetters discovered that the original 60 (a basketball hoop screwed to a public tree) had been removed, so I looked up my very long shortlist of “finds” to come up with hasty alternative (a sign saying “which way”).
What I hadn’t accounted for was a sneaky addition to a checkpoint. I’d spotted the topiary ducks (checkpoint 62) on a dog walk just a month before the event. I have a particular obsession with topiaries, and so I did a last-minute substitute from a rather banal Bunnings lizard sculpture in an adjacent street. A topiary is pretty slow growing – not much could change in a couple of weeks… or so I thought. On the day of the event, as the metrogaine competitors started to come in, sweaty and tired and happy, I got reports of the topiaries with “hats and scarves”. Curious, I later had a chat to the owner of the ducks and discovered someone had tipped him off about the ducks being included as a question on the morning of the event and he’d rushed out to give them scarves and hats in celebration (apparently they get Santa hats at Christmas too). Unfortunately, the extra clothing led to some interesting answers because the ducks’ forms were obscured, but hopefully this story makes up for the confusion.
Thanks go to all the volunteers who helped out before and during the event, particularly Gary Carroll, who created and maintains the master Hobart map, as well as the vetters: Neil Hawthorne, Bernard Walker, Sara Brain, and Gary. Metrogaines only happen if we have setters to create the courses, so if you’re in the habit of passing features and thinking “that’d make a good checkpoint”, I encourage you to get in touch about setting a future event.