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Hacienda:


Game play moves around, usually with us defining new boundaries every evening that we play. We'll usually pick
four roads that create a box, and you have to hide inside that box. But because major roads often have good
spots right on either side, we created the "two block rule", meaning you could be up to two blocks outside the
defined boundaries.

It was my turn to hide, and we were in Cedar Falls. The West boundary tonight was Hudson Road. I had noticed
earlier that there was a little side road that branched East off Hudson Road and had been wanting to explore
it. (if you play enough C&M you start subconsciously keeping your eyes peeled for good hiding spots) So we
turn into Hacienca Circle. It goes in a little ways and then is just a cul de sac of houses. There's a street
light at the circle, but the light at the turn off Hudson Road is out, so it's pretty dark. And bushes on the
corners are making this road especially hard to spot. Plus there's no light on the intersection at Hudson
Road either. AND Hacienda doesn't cross Hundson. In fact, Hudson Road is a divided highway at that spot,
so you must be traveling North to even be able to turn on it. This is all looking VERY good for us. Oh and the
speed limit there is 45 mph, so any cats driving by aren't going to have much of a chancel to notice this road
as they drive by. Even the street sign is hidden by an overgrown tree. Excellent.

So we park there, in the darkness. I think we had a full car of four people. And it wasn't too warm either,
must have been a fall or spring night. Now a "typical" hide will last around half an hour. But we were staying
hidden there for quite some time. At about the hour point everyone was pretty close, and we occasionally would
see someone drive by with their dome light on - that's usually a cat that has a passenger looking at a road map.
But they would come and go, and still nobody was finding us. They'd been driving within 100ft of my car too.

Then in conversation it came up, they were all behind us. We had hidden directly behind the high school
at the end of their football and track field. Those poor people had been spending the last half hour trying to
find a way to drive back there to look for us. At this point they had stopped caring about the grass and were
just out tooling around in the fields behind the school and little buildings, getting an absolutely HUGE
signal on their radios, but with no way to see us. But at this point, they were committed. Someone WAS
going to be the one to find us, there's no surrender tonight. And so it went on. We stayed there for over
TWO HOURS before we finally see a dome lighted car pull up and STOP at the intersection in front of us and
demand we talk. Of course our transmission positively spikes their radio and they turn right in to claim
their victory. Total hide time was about 2:15, well past 1am. And that wrapped it up for the night.

That hide would forever go down in history as the Hacienda Hide.




last updated 11/15/2023 at 12:31:25