Back to the Town Hall!

26 runners braved another damp January evening to head to beautiful Limehouse Town Hall where task owner Brian was thoroughly well prepped for us for the second visit of a two week task.

It was a hive of activity as the runners set about bustling around this amazing building scrubbing, sawing, drilling, clearing and descaling, and polyfilling...Amazing.

Teams were dispersed all over the building, with Tracey heading up the cleaning team, dispatched to the incredible wrought iron staircase and theatre balcony, to deftly get into every nook and cranny with electric toothbrushes; Dave saved the day with his electrical know-how, while Leo headed up Team Filler blitzing holey walls, and Isabelle, Suraj, Stefan, Steve, Joel and Chris blitzed the boarding. Amazing stuff.

The time flew by quite incredibly and before we knew it, task owner Brian had taken creative control and had us replicating the iconic Beatles EMI stairwell pic as a fantastic task finale.

Job. Done.

And then we ran back to base, animated and exhilarated at all we'd achieved, and been part of.

Big shout out's

A big thank tonight to Bryon for leading the team to the task, Ivo for backmarking, and Leo for additional pics.

And a massive warm welcome to Craig, who joined us for his first run tonight. Thanks for your huge contribution and we hope to see you really soon.

What's coming up

• Next week we’re a two-task team: we’re at a brand new task, just around the corner, helping the Poets Corner Community Garden, while a second team are heading up the road to join the Meath Gardens crew for some clearing and much needed litter picking. All the details and sign up can be found here.

• And in two weeks’ time, on Feb 10th, The Tower Hamlets Monthly Social commences! This month is hosted by Isabelle, who’s booked us ample table space at the nearby Fugitive Motel, so whether you fancy a cheeky Monday Magners, or some heavenly, reasonably priced pizza, and a natter, do come and join us.

In the meantime, have a really good week: Take care, and hope to see you very, very soon.

24 Hackney GoodGymers ran 6k to Abney Park Cemetery to shovel 2 tonnes of mulch to complete the final mulch path of the Winter!

Great job by a great team this evening!! Great to see the experienced GoodGymers going strong and guiding the new runners at the beginning of what will Be an awesome GG journey!!

3k our to Stokey to meet Park ranger Quentin at the magical Abney Park Cemetery! Grabbing the narrows, lights, rakes and shovels we headed off to the far corner of the park to find the last remaining unmulched path.

Trying to create the most lite pathway to allow for easy barrowing we kind of succeeded but it was still a bit of an adventure!

A rotating team of Shovellers kept the barrows rolling at a great pace and mulch pile going down fast!

Zipping around the loop tipping out the mulch and dancing the moguls back to the Shovellers on repeat! A great pace was set and we managed to pretty much complete the 2 tonne pile of mulch in 40 minutes of action!!

Our mulching efforts are a massive help to the park as it helps to enable all the park to remain accessible to more people throughout the year! This helps look after the historic grave site as well as curb antisocial behaviour!

As we completed the path and dropped off the tools with an excellent job complete Quinten announced that Abney has just found out that their application for a multimillion pound refurbishment of the historic building in Abney has been successful!! This is a massive boost to not only the park but the local community! Was amazing to hear the our work going to Abney each month was a major contributor to the application helping to show high volumes and consistent volunteering as well as community engagement!!

Not only that but Jatin will be running the London Marathon in aid of Abney this year!! Let’s all help him along in his training and fundraising!!

See you next week for our visit to Hackney Parks!!

Enjoy

Joel

p.s Thanks Liz for the pictures!!

22 Hackney GoodGymers enjoyed a crisp January Starter session on Hackney Downes planting and caring for trees with the brilliant Tree Musketeers!

Amazing to have so many GG first timers along for the session!!

Be great to have you along to the Hackney Tuesday evening runs which start and finish at the E5 Bakehouse!! Meet at 6:45 leave by 7 and with a run, task combo complete we are back by 8:30!!

If Tuesdays are tricky then there are other areas close by on Monday and Wednesday’s plus community missions mainly on the weekend which have a task but not the run.

All the information is on the GoodGym website!!

A quick 2k run to raise our body temperatures from the -1 we started at was much needed. We then headed over to the task and with an unprecedented number of volunteers who had come along to the open session jobs were a little thin on the ground but helping where we could with tree planting, mulching the baby trees, weeding, digging, running the barrows all over the Downes we helped to turn a 4 hour window to get the work done into a 2 hour tree helping blast!

Throwing in some fitness with Chi to keep the body warm at the end it was great to have you along!!

Hope to see you on a run again soon!!

Joel