42 brilliant members of the Two Circles team arrived brilliantly punctually in St James Gardens this afternoon.

On what turned out to be a pretty nice afternoon, we gathered in this pretty park to say our hellos, get an idea of what we’d be doing this afternoon and of course, squeeze a bit of fitness in.

After the obligatory intros, off we got to a splendid start with some squats, stretches, a lunge or two and a little bit of balance work.

As the last of today’s team joined, we made our way a few yards around the corner to the Royal Foundation of Saint Katherine to meet Larry, who was leading today’s activity.

Why were we here?

‘In 2011, St Katharine’s opened its doors to the public. It has become a place where groups and individuals can stay, meet, reflect and retreat. In 2020, St Katharine’s offered itself to become part of the NHS provision for The Royal London and Barts. A dynamic volunteer network, Limehouse Aid, also joined St Katharine’s, which now hosts a food bank distributing food.

St Katharine’s is also a thriving arts and community organisation, hosting London’s only Yurt café.’

Today we were working on a new project that involved transforming a disused space into a new garden area around the Yurt Café.

Our four brilliant team captains

Larry wasted no time in dividing us into four teams, complete with four brilliant team captains.

Two teams headed to the area below the café, one weeding around the community centre, and one working on the heavy lifting job of emptying soil from planters and beds.

Another two teams worked on The Big Weeding Job: one headed to the entrance, tackling borders in the most visible areas; another to ‘the DLR entrance’ working around paths and the planters to give this area a good tidy-up.

And it all got done. Remarkable.

With just 20 minutes to go, we glanced at the remaining planter areas wondering if the soil would be levelled off and wheeled away by 4pm.

It was.

Incredible work in such a short space of time.

Larry and his team are now ready to move on to the next phase of this important project, thanks to you all.