Oh what a night. Mid January back in '17. 24 runners came out looking keen. And cleaned up Spring Hill, what a night!

Tonight's task was to meet with Incredible Edible Bristol and help them to tidy up one of there 'unofficial' plots. This plot had been looked after previously by a caring local, who sadly passed away. But it appears that in her honour a bunch of guerrilla gardeners have been doing a great job to keep her memory alive. Saying that the area still gets used as a dumping ground and the large trees around had covered the ground in a megaton of leaves. This all had to go before a memorial could be held to remember the lovely lady who made it what it is today.

It was a relatively short run from Vivo to the Bearpit where we met Hannah from Incredible Edible. She gave us a warm welcome and introduced us to our tools for the evening. Forks, spades, trowels and a wheelbarrow especially for Paul(like anyone else had a chance to use it!) We loaded up and walked up the hill to the area to be cleared (some of us running a bit too far up as we just could let a hill go half completed). As ever, everyone was keener than 2 year old Labrador covered in mustard waiting to go for a walk in the lake district to get started. There was raking, digging, litter picking and all sorts of topiary going on. The megaton of leaves became a mega pile, which we bagged up as much as possible with Emma utilising the limited amount of bags we had to great effect. A forward party even ran back down the hill with bags of leaves, dropped them in the mulch pile in the Bearpit and brought the reusable bags back up to take more leaves down. Goota love the iniciative to get the job done.
After we had cleared and cleaned as much as we could we dropped the tools back at the Bearpit, waved goodbye to Hannah and ran back to Queen Square for some tricep dips, press-ups and a warm down.

Big congratulations to Alex on her 50th deed today! You may have only joined us recently from Bath but we already feel like you've been part of the gang for ages.

This Saturday's run is to St Mary Redcliff Primary in Victoria Park to help the clean up more leaves! And next Tuesday we are going to Portland Square to prepare the beds for some spring planting.

Thanks to everyone who came tonight, and to Alice for the pun. You guys are the greatest.

See you soon,

Gary

This week we had our largest turn out of the year, 25 smiley faces ran to Emmaus to help fix up donated furniture for sale in their shop.

Emmaus are a charity that helps homeless people get back on their feet through guidance, support and the opportunity to work and learn new skills. Their warehouse and shops in Bristol take in donated furniture which is then fixed up and sold to raise funds. Our job for the evening was to fix up as much as we could in 30 minutes. On our previous visit we managed 12 items, so that was the score to beat.

Everyone was keen to drawer on their skills and mirror their efforts from last time to make sure this was a table topping performance. The guys sanding were definitely up-to-scratch especially Rachael and Georgina who sanded their cupboard smoother than Tom Jones in a leather catsuit. New to the GoodGym cabinet was Oliver(welcome!) who had the backing of the veterans to repair his desk. And Lisa tapped into her DIY DNA to beautify a sink cabinet. Time flew by and it was soon time to shelve the tools. Final coats of varnish brought a shine to our performance as we stood in wonder over the 25 (yes, TWENTY-FIVE!) fixed up pieces of furniture. The excitement was hard to handle!

We bid farewell to our wonderful host Xanne and ran off into the night. Despite me forgetting my bag and having to run back to get it, we sailed back to Queens Square where Matt put the speedy group through some drills. We all warmed down, stretched and congratulated ourselves on a job well done.

We have a run this Saturday to help Surfers Against Sewage clean up the Avon River under the suspension bridge and our Tuesday run next week sees us return to Spring Hill to help out Incredible Edible.

Thanks everyone who came along tonight it was a fantastic team effort and you lot absolutely smashed it (not literally, that wouldn't have been very helpful at all...)

Big love to each one of you. See you soon.

Gary

On a cold and frosty evening 18 intrepid adventurers clad in red braved the cold and helped to clean up the litter left from the festive period along the Malago Greenway in South Bristol.

We met inside Vivo, discussing tales of Christmas and New Year. The warm glow of reunions with our fellow runners made it feel like spring outside, well almost, we still needed to warm up properly by shooing the new year in through the gate (it made sense if you were there...). Once we were warm we split into two groups, Wallace and Gromit. The aim was to tidy up as much litter discarded over the holidays along the Malago Greenway cycle path as possible. The Gromits ran 1.5 miles to Marksbury Road Open Space, while the Wallaces ran 1 mile to Bedminster Common. Each group cleared their way along the path meeting in the middle at St John's Burial Ground.

There was lots to tidy up, including a welly found by our guiding light Chloe (see photos), a knife sheaf found by new recruit Heather, and a soggy, unwanted card game called Cards Against Humanity. We certainly made a difference and were thanked by local people as they passed. Many bags were filled and children's play parks and public footpaths were made much more pleasant.

On our return to Queen Square we played a game of 'Grab the Gloves'. Teams competed in a sprint relay to take gloves from a rival group and place them in their own pile. The team with the most gloves at the end wins. Congratulations to the winners, Team 4, led by crazy ultra runner Matt.

We finished with some stretches and a few notifications. We have a run this Saturday, and another brilliant one next Tuesday that is not to be missed. There are also load of races in the events list on the website so check them out and sign up to something challenging.

Thanks to everyone for coming along, and thanks Matt for the great pun, you're ruddy great!

Gary