There’s no better way to bring back this blog then to talk about Hell Ride.

Okay, there’s probably a lot of better ways. But this is the one you get.

     As explained in an earlier post, “This annual tradition, peculiar to Blacker Hovse, is probably the most construction-intensive Blacker event after Interhovse and Ditch Day. In it, the frosh attempt to play Richard Wagner’s “The Ride of the Valkyries” (which is strictly banned at Caltech except for 7am during finals week, or if it is played as part as Wagner’s entire cycle of four operas: The Ring of the Nibelung) for as long as possible as the upperclassmen attempt to shut it off. This is traditionally done by barricading the speakers in the all-frosh alley Hell (thus the name Hellride). There have been stories of moles going so far to shut off The Ride as destroying walls, breaking down doors, and once even shooting the speakers when they were mounted at the top of a palm tree. “

     Planning for Hell Ride started off in first term. We decided to take an nontraditional route and hold it in the middle of the courtyard during second term (the past few years it’s been done in Hell around third term). As the date drew closer, we started amassing a bunch of wood from the local dumpster, and ultimately ended up with plenty of barricade supplies thanks to a number of fruitful dumpster dives. The carpenter’s shop actually gave us a slab of their heaviest material for free after a group of female frosh asked them for scraps – apparently they were really excited to see girls building things.

     The building of Hell ride really got into the swing of things after dinner on Friday February 28th, despite the day’s rain and the evening’s drizzle. After the sound system was placed in the drain (thankfully we had thought ahead to put it in a waterproof container), concrete started getting mixed and poured to form the centerpiece of our barrier – a cube of solid concrete on top of the drain. A good bulk of the evening was spent making the concrete, and a large part of the night was spent cleaning it up.

     It was pouring rain the whole day, leaving Kit to run around and make sure the Courtyard didn’t flood. As it turns out, the drain we blocked was pretty important for, well, drainage. Not much work was done since rain and power tools don’t really mix.

     Concrete was poured again in the early (and thankfully sunny) afternoon. We made our last batch, finishing the central 2-ton cube of concrete over the drain. We then started on the innermost ring of defense – the best and strongest wood we had was placed to encompass the concrete cube. The best piece (the one we got from the carpenter’s shop) went directly on top of the cube. Cutting it to fit led to some really sad (but sort of hilarious) noises from the circ saw, and after screwing the board in Mary went around and stripped the screws. We added metal grates around the sides, which left gaps in the corners, so we filled them with trollsy stuff – one corner had stuff from e-waste, one had scrap wood and tennis balls, one had our empty concrete bags and an extra tire, and one had a drawer with two shirts folded in it that had been on the free table for about two weeks. One of the barriers on top of the cube was a large rectangular crate that we filled with cinderblocks and screwed shut. The screwing shut of this crate at 5 am resulting in a noise complaint from the RA, so we had to stop using tools for the night. A bit disappointing, as we wanted to finish the inner barrier before Monday morning. A few of us had worked on it almost nonstop from about noon to 6am, with a break for an interhovse meeting and another later to do the math set due the next day. After sunrise, we covered what we had finished and got some much-needed sleep.

     I was up at noon and joined Kit, Harrison, and Emily already working in the courtyard. We worked straight until dinner, getting all of our non-pallet things screwed in around the sides. We left random messages amongst the various layers, like targets with “smash here” written by them, random gdbgs, a few YOLOs, some “Frosh power”s and at least one “smashy smashy.” We finished doing this a little before dinner, then covered our now very interesting structure with black plastic to prevent upperclassmen seeing and planning for the destruction of any layers. As we were working in the afternoon, we started to see upperclassmen walking around and making plans of their own. We caught wind of one – Yurko was going to attach a line from his car to around the concrete and try to pull it off the drain. I was intrigued If this worked, it was going to be really impressive. If it didn’t, it was going to be really hilarious. Either way, it was going to be awesome.

     After dinner we affixed the pallets around and on top of our barricade, taking a break to blast Les Mis music and sing along at the top of our lungs from the top of our barricade. To our sleep deprived minds, this was pretty entertaining. After we had everything either attached or just thrown on, we rolled out the Hell carpet (literally). Earlier this month they had replaced the carpet in hell, we had gotten our hands on the rolls of old carpet and decided to incorporate them. It was Hell Ride, after all. So a bit of Hell was brought to Hell Ride, since we didn’t bring Hell Ride to Hell. We rolled the carpet out by the steps, and rolled one as a path from the courtyard steps to Hell Ride. On the carpet by the steps, we put out all the various instruments of destruction – saws, sledgehammers, drivers, drills, ect. Some of the smores even added things – crowbars they had just bought and saws of their own. And email was sent out – Hell Ride is happening between 11 and 11:30. At 11:10, another one saying Hell Ride is within the next 10 minutes. And at 11:17, the ride started playing from the drains.

     We had a total time of 15 minutes and 44 seconds, better than the Hell Rides of recent memory. The sound system was rather soft, given that our speaker was inside of a tupperware container, but it was audible and that’s what mattered. Laying out all the weapons ahead of time made things start off really well. While the ten minute warning was in effect, upperclassmen were grabbing things and surrounding the structure at the “Frosh Only Past Here” line we had drawn, waiting for the ride to start. It went really smoothly. The ride started, they all converged, and the destruction commenced. The pallets we had placed around took a good 10 seconds to take off, and I stopped counting after that. In a cacophony of sawing noises, hammering, and the sound of boards getting yanked apart, Hell Ride was getting peeled apart like an onion. I really enjoyed it when someone shouted “It would be faster to unscrew it!”, referencing a particularly hard board to break. However, this was at the layer in which we had already stripped the screws.

     Once the main cube of concrete was reached, the Yurko Car plan went into effect. Everyone cleared the courtyard while a few wrapped the line around the block and got in the car, which was right outside the east gate. With a lot of screeching, it didn’t budge. After a reconversion on it and some smashing, a few layers of wood on the top were taken off and they decided to try it again, with more people in the car for weight. This time, they succeeded and the cube slid off the drain (but not without putting up a bit of a fight). There was a dash to the drain, a confiscation of the tupperware, and a breaking of the sound system. Hell Ride was over, but the showering had just begun.

The destruction of Hell Ride.

What ultimately was our defeat.