This was a last minute or short notice request from Action West London for their Electrical Fixing & Training workshop on the 9th October, but Goodgym Ealing are always up for a challenge and listed the community mission. I, Steph Ducat was leading the solo mission as on my own but it kept me busy. Started at Greenford Re-Use and Recycling Centre with 150 leaflets and targeted the residents around the area. So one person with 150 leaflets and covered 3km by foot. Do good stay fit!! So that is 50 leaflets/km : sounds like running or walking stats. It was windy so had to hold tight to the leaflets like the panda holding to the fence I pictured on the route. After a 3km walk from house the house all the leaflets had gone from my hands : gone with the wind?

After a great lunch at Horseden Farm with fellow Goodgymers, 3 Goodgymers set off through the woods to their next community mission. A small walk of 2km and we met Jatinder from CIC and Joseph joined shortly after. We did not know what to expect today but we were in for a good typical workout reserved for Goodgym. It was their first time for Maxime and Ashley at this urban garden and were impressed by the vineyards, bee hives and the polytunnel and outside area. Today we had the task to clear a section so that new beds can be installed in the near future and enable more planting. As windy day, it was hard to know what layers to keep on, but Steph Ducat as usual was in T-Shirt and then Ashley soon took his layers off due to the workout. Maxime also started to layer off. The clearing was not as easy as you think as we had to get all the roots out : a lot of bramble roots which seemed to be all connected together and never ending underground. "B"root force was the moto for today and we were able to take loads out. We did find different colored roots from wood brown to black and a weird red. Some also had looks of parts of a human : human heart shaped. After a 90 minute session the 3 Goodgymers beat the roots. We all then left to follow our own "roots" back to different occupations.

As Storm Amy approached Ealing, a whirlwind of West London GoodGymers landed at Horsenden Farm. A strong team of seventeen hasn't been seen in Ealing for a long time. It took the joint forces of Ealing, Hounslow and Richmond to build a do-good brigade so large that it surprised even the task owner, Elsa, who scrambled to find more tasks for them.

We welcomed two new joiners, Bernadette and Tom, who chose to kick off their GoodGym adventure dangerously close to the Gruffalo Trail at Horsenden Hill. With such an impressive team, the chances of being eaten by a Gruffalo were close to zero. At the same time, the odds of having fun with good company while getting active in nature before eating carb-heavy, cheesy goodness from a local bakery were very high!

Our regulars from the Hounslow group runs had a chance to welcome back the unstoppable Lucy after the break she had to take in the last couple of weeks. Great to see you again, Lucy!

Two of the tasks given by Elsa had a lot to do with the mysterious disappearance of Horsenden pigs. The first assignment, taken by Steph Ducat, Iram, Kymm and Gus, was to transfer hay from the broken-down hay bales to the former pig quarters and spread it on the ground. I chose to believe it was to secure the traces of a pignapping crime until the arrival of the forensics team. Steph described the effort as hay-way to hell as the gusts of wind kept blowing the hay out of the wheelbarrows. Kymm reported there were as many techniques to spread the hay as GoodGymers: from gleeful tossing, through grumpy kicking to methodical arranging.

Sevan and Bernadette had a task of clearing weeds, mostly nettles, near the Horsenden Loaf pizza oven. Sevan shared that they were setting the stage for the hog roast the following day. That shed some light on the disappearance of the pigs - they must have escaped when they heard about the whole hog roast enterprise!

The largest squad undertook a mammoth job of clearing brambles to expand a meadow where the farm cows could graze to help establish a grassland with plenty of wildlife on the slope of Horsenden Hill. Gaby, Ariane, Tom, Mairaj, Maxime, Afshin, Thaiza, Lucy and Kash were chopping, lopping or slashing the blackberry invaders while Anita and Ash raked away the cuttings.

The cherry on a cake was that all the activity was observed through the lens of photographer Laura, who did a great job of not interrupting our tasks while capturing the spirit of GoodGym and the beauty of Horsenden Hill. We are hoping our part-time modelling gig today will help spread the word about GoodGym in the coming months. It will probably also disclose our soft spot for Horsenden pizza!

Inspired by today's task? Join the Horsenden session next month! Sign up now!