In Lewisham, the start of the Christmas period isn’t signalled by any TV adverts, baubles appearing in shop windows, or even the first bite of a mince pie. Here, we set our festive clock by the Blackheath Christmas Fair and this week was our first-of-two tasks distributing their flyers in aid of Age Exchange!

Having suffered wet weather in previous years (along with the dreaded floppy-flyer syndrome that can cause!), a dry if cool evening was welcomed by our squad of 7 as we divvied out the 600 flyers before heading out from Glass Mills.

After a short uphill run to our muster point, and having split into 2 mini-teams, meticulously marked up maps were on hand to guide both around their respective streets selected to receive our festive fair tidings (though note-to-self: yellow highlighter doesn’t show up well under yellow streetlights!).

There were even flyers and time-enough to tackle a few extra streets before we all met back up right on time for groups pics (with a graveyard theme?!) and a nice downhill homeward run.

Same time, same place, same task next week? Why not, see you there!

This Monday’s run was the Group’s first since the clocks changed, but the lack of light didn’t deter us from braving our longest regular run to PNK Garden.

There we were met by Victoria, our sister-from-another-mister (i.e. GG Greenwich!), who had organised and prepped all the tools “weed” need to deliver some difference to this little oasis of green near Surrey Quays.

The evening’s efforts would be split: whilst Jenny concentrated on tidying weeds around the wooden benches within the gardens, the rest of us took to the streets (well… just the one street) to tackle all foliage growing external to the fencing.

And quite a bit of growth there was too, with PNK’s linear nature involving a long fence line! Our floodlights came in handy to illuminate proceedings, as well as to alert passing pedestrians of our presence.

After half an hour of graft, more than half a dozen bags had been filled with a mix of brambles (thanks Victoria for leading the charge on those!), small weeds, and rather tougher more established plants, requiring some long-lopper action. With Jenny having filled further bags, we combined the fruits of our labour before Victoria presented us with a thank you gift of some locally grown and freshly harvested Rosemary – a lovely scent in our nostrils before tackling the 2.5 miles back to Glass Mills!

Next week will be a shorter affair, as we begin our annual flyering for the Age Exchange Christmas Fare.

It was time for a trip to Senior's and after a summer of helping in the garden, it was time to move back inside which we were very glad of when we arrived at Glass Mill and it was cold and windy with signs of potential rain to come.

There was no time for hanging around, everyone was cold and we had some hills to tackle. It's always satisfying run when Senior's involved because you know you've tackled the hills twice.

On arrival at Seniors, we were greeted by Di who explained the task for the evening which was cleaning the radiators, tables, chairs and toys in the cafe. We had one strict rule to follow: no leaving water on the chairs. Last time we did this task there might've been a few soggy bottoms the next day!!

Time flies and after getting in our favourite task of the year (putting the Christmas decs up - 16th Dec) it was time to say our goodbyes and head off to either the pub or run back to Glass Mill.

In the history of leading group runs, I don't think I've taken such a small amount of photos. The important thing here is this was definitely quality over quantity!!

We haven't been to The Albany for a couple of months and we were pleasantly surprised to see the grass had been cut, and the works completed. It gave us an easier task of spotting the litter. Luckily we have Paul-sized bin bags (as confirmed in the photos) to hold all the litter. It was mainly the usual suspects of glass bottles, cans and chicken shop boxes. Nothing exciting for once, no bags full of snails, shoes or wigs.

We were done and dusted ahead of time and just as it started to rain we made our way back to Glass Mill.

Next week we are heading to Senior's, a longer and hillier run but nothing we can't achieve together!

Tonight's GoodGym mission saw us racing against a (frankly beautiful) setting sun as 11 GoodGym-ers headed to the gardens outside Trinity Hospital in Greenwich, with the aim of helping tidy this area by the Thames Riverside.

Our tasks included a lot of weeding of plant beds, clearing away fallen autumn leaves, as well as a good pruning session to chop back overhanging trees/shrubs including the aforementioned Buddleia. A tough battle was fought but all too soon, the setting sun gave way to a Harvest Moon, signalling our task was done for the evening and we could head to the pub!

Hopefully we had a positive impact on this lovely area by the river. Thanks all!

Next week we're at the Prince Maritime Collections Centre. Until next time!