Sunday saw Good Gym back at Westcombe Woodlands, one of our favourite tasks and this month saw a new variation on the usual theme, namely that alongside the usual and eternal brambles we now had to remove a large number of Robinia plants. The plant is a non-native species that is not terribly good at providing a habitat for local species, including the many bats that inhabit the woods (stay tuned for news on September bat walks batfans). It turned out to be a tough old thing too: the plants were well established with a deep rooting system that all needed to come out. But Good Gym persists and after 90 minutes or so (including a welcome tea break) we’d cleared a lot of unwanted plants from the woods.

Thanks to all who came and thanks to Marta for the pun

What a glorious evening to be newt and aboot with GoodGym Greenwich! With 13 of us gathered and the sun shining brightly, we set off on a scenic run through beautiful Greenwich Park, with Marta managing to sneak in the final part of her interval training en route!

A happy welcome back to Jia for her second good geed with us!

Our destination was the lovely garden of St Alfege’s Primary School, where we were met with a list of garden tasks organised by Amanda the Headteacher who popped in to say hello! Between us, we:

🌱 Weeded garden beds and turned over the soil

🛶 Emptied out a boat planter and refilled it with fresh soil

🌳 Replanted a tree

🛞 Emptied and weeded tyre planters, topping them up with fresh compost

📦 Cleared out and organised some storage crates

But, you ask - what's with title of the report? Well, we also found a newt who was very sweet. Ivar may have wanted to adopt him but settled for popping him back in the pond area. One of the cuter amphibians in my opinion and a lovely surprise this evening.

Anyway, with such a great team, the jobs were done in no time and after a group pic we enjoyed a little river run back to base before parting ways for the evening, with that satisfying post-good-deed glow.

St Alfege’s is starting a monthly community gardening session, so keep an eye out for more tasks coming soon as the school transforms this space for wider community use!

Coming up next...

🎉 This Saturday we’re helping set up and close down at the Beats, Boards, and BBQ event in Charlton Park and we have gardening at Hervey Road

🏃‍♀️ Next Wednesday we’ll be meeting at Charlton House for a group run to Brooklands School for more garden work!

Until next time, wonderful people! 👋

Rachel

We're continuing our gardening preparations, with more volunteers helping out - 3 C’s from Goodgym (Chloe, Calvin and Cecilia); *with Isabella , helping Owen.

What we did: - We removed the cardboards that served as weed barrier. - We removed stubborn weeds and dig out the roots with hope of preventing regrowth. - we cleared the soil and ensured it’s free from rubbish, such as plastic, big stones, etc. (Raking and hand-picking them) - we used landscape membranes or weed barriers and secured them firmly with hooks. - As a finishing touch, we spread woodchips over the prepared area.

After completing the day task, we were kindly offered tea and biscuits—an irresistible treat that made it almost impossible to say no! ☺️ Till next time. 👋🏼😃

Everyone loves a new GoodGym Task, and tonight's was a summery evening treat, as 7 GoodGym-ers made their way up Shooters Hill to The Memorial Hospital, where our tasks awaited us in various shapes and sizes, leading us to hidden depths on the outskirts of Oxleas Woods.

After a briefing from the venue team, Maira and Karen, we got stuck in with litter picking, tearing up brambles and shovelling woodchip for distribution over some ivy growth. Others hacked away at gnarly tree roots which had evil intentions to trip unwary travellers on their route through the woods.

Our time had soon run out, so we wandered back to base, listening to stories of castle ruins and hidden lakes in the woodlands.

Mission accomplished, the run back down the hill was much kinder and it's time to say Au Revoir, until the next task!

Special welcome to Jia for your first good deed with us - great to have you join the group and Sam, kudos for your second good deed in a week - lovely to have you back with us!

Next wednesday we've got another new task at a school in Greenwich and this sunday we've got some more woodland work at Westcombe Woods- hope to see you soon!

I didn't know what a pocket park was until today.

As I trundled over to East Greenwich, anxiety chimed through me. And it caused my mind to race.

One by one, my mind went through my wardrobe. My running shorts had small pockets for essential items like 2-3 Maltesers or Smarties, whilst my trousers and jeans had pouches that could fit (at a push) a whole lunch of 5 or so Kit Kats. But even in my large-pocketed dungarees, I'd only ever managed to fit a medium-sized Easter egg.

I just didn't know how we were all going to fit into this pocket park. Especially with social distancing. I stopped my running to eat a Malteser to calm my thoughts. A stranger walked past and I asked them "COULD YOU FIT 5 PEOPLE IN YOUR POCKET?" Just the thought made them anxious and they ran away.

But this is the wonderful thing about GoodGym - you learn important things. Things you would never know otherwise. For a pocket park, contrary to all linguistic common sense, isn't actually housed in a pocket. There aren't (and I did ask) any pockets there at all. It apparently means 'small'. And everyone agreed that 'small park' didn't sound that great.

Anyway, you, like me, have now had the veil of ignorance lifted. And you'll be glad that it has, for the wonderful Blackwall Pocket Park is becoming something delightfully wonderful. The indefatigable Philippa has set her eyes on three spots of underloved and forgotten roadside greenery and is bringing the community together to transform them into urban meadows and butterfly gardens. Truly awesome.

And our merry crew of 5 good-deeders played our first part in helping on this journey today. Good-deeding supremos Claire, Marta, Rachel, and Sara (and I tagged along too) got straight to 90 minutes of non-stop litter picking. The land, which sits on the approach to the Blackwall Tunnel, has become a bit of a dumping ground. It's almost, and so very sadly, as if the rubbish is bedded into the ground. Philippa told us about how she'd found a wrapper for a 'Marathon' bar the other day - which, if you're curious, went out of circulation in 1990...

Along the way, we nattered and caught up, with many of us talking about life starting to turn its corner back towards something more normal. It was a treat to spend the time together. And we wrapped up our final bin bags (about 10-12 in total) as the afternoon sun was starting on its descent towards twilight. An afternoon well spent, and hopefully one we'll be able to repeat as we lend more helping hands to this wonderful project soon.

Nice one.

A lovely session at Mycenae Gardens today as we tackled the ever-determined weeds with plenty of energy – and a sweet reward at the end!

We were delighted to welcome Sam to his very first GoodGym session – great to have you on board Sam, and we hope it’s the first of many!

Fuelled by sunshine the team made great progress clearing bed 4 and Arthur did a mighty job finding as many pine cones as he could. A huge thank you to one of the Friends of Mycenae Gardens volunteers for the delicious cake – always appreciated and very much enjoyed!

After our efforts, we treated ourselves to a well-earned coffee at the café, catching up and winding down. A perfect end to a productive morning.

Well done team – as always, you smashed it! 💪

Coming up:

Tomorrow: Join us for a scenic river walk – a great chance to stretch those legs and enjoy the views.

Next Wednesday we’re heading to the Memorial Hospital for our very first task there, note a 6.30pm start to give us longer to get up that hill!

Until next time! 👟🌼

Rachel