Wow 34 GoodGymers chopped down two trees, shifted 5 tons of soil, weeded, litter picked AND made a fire.

On a dry (bit of rain) Wednesday evening we met in Somers Town to do good and get fit. We talked about volunteering at Run Hackney and cheering at the London Marathon - check it out! We had two lovely tasks, the first at Alara and the second at Castlehaven, both GGC regulars and both amazing projects. After an active warm up and technical focus on arm technique (socket to pocket) we spilt forces and headed in two groups to do good.

Socket to Pocket

Alara Report by PB:

A lovely 21 of us headed to Alara to help do various tasks, we met Vlad and he explained the wonder of things to do. Lucia and Frances's teams weeded the orchard project, Jess's team lifted 5 tons of bagged soil from A to B and Becky's team made a fire. Also a foray of litter picking was done by all.

5 tons of woah!

Here's some hard facts, 5 tons of soil is the same as:

• 20 pigs
• 1.25 hippos
• 2 Giraffes
• 3 cars
• 4/5 of a T-Rex
• 60 Kangaroos
  
• 2/3 of an Elephant
• AND 71.99 PB's

After we had a successful time clearing up, tidying and generally helping Alara, who have been nominated for a Green Award by the way, we were each given some muesli - BOOM - with our arms worked out, we headed along the canal to Granary Square. Before our wonderful monthly time trial we reminded ourselves of the arm technique we learnt earlier.

Everyone smashed the 850 metre time trial with Neil finishing in 2.47, Steve in 2.56 and Lucia & James joint 3rd in 3.08. If you'd like to know your time please just contact me.

Castlehaven report by Pritesh:

Tree Fellers required…

Well we weren’t in Ireland so that joke was never going to work but this week 13 of us set off. Amongst our group we counted a Norwegian, a Dane, an Americanista, a yoga teacher and a certified Ax-er! Whatever Castlehaven had for us we were ready for them!

Somewhere between Paul’s, sure to become legendary, ‘socket to pocket’ technical exercise and reaching our destination at Castlehaven our task had grown from two trees to ten and we were all pretty excited to wield axes, saws and generally show a lot of brute force. We were slightly brought back down to earth when the wonderful Fred outlined our task: dig, prune and cut till we had heaved two trees out of the ground! Still a chance for the brute GG force to come out.

GG Saw of Doom

We split the group, with some litter-picking, some working on digging the trees out and the rest on pruning duty. Pretty early on we realised that there’s a reason that trees have been around for so long and these guys weren’t coming out easy… cue the GoodGym Saw of Doom…ahem, well Fred gave us a saw and we got to it. Particular shouts to Kaspar, Steve C and Tom for their efforts to get these trees chopped. With the trees felled, we set to work on some pruning over the containers, check the before and after pics that is better than my hairdresser manages!

Castlehaven litter find of the week…socks and a latte glass from Liv but Steve C takes the prize with the vegetable knife modelled by Will. A reminder to be vigilant and stay safe but also showing how important a simple litter picking exercise can be.

Yoga move of the week

With our task finishing earlier we went down for a canal blast to granary square to meet with the rest of the team and then head to base before a stretch down and a return for ‘yoga move of the week’ from Liv with a Prasarita Padottanasana.

Great running with everyone and always great to get a job done on the night! Next week Simon is in charge and you are going to Kentish Town City Farm - sign up here

Thanks all - PB & Pritesh