What a gorgeous morning to be back at Felling Park!

Katy, Eleanor, Debbie and Tanya braved the early morning start to help out the Friends of Felling Park with the upkeep of the beautiful community areas.

The volunteers were filling new flower beds by the bowling green with fresh soil, while the GoodGymers weeded a flower bed, and are hoping we can help them plant them all up soon!

It's lovely to be able to revisit places and see what new things we can help with, so keep your eyes peeled for another Saturday morning mission here soon :)

The weather was quite a bit different today compared to our last visit to Felling Park; instead of torrential rain (read about that madness here) we had glorious sunshine and a pleasant breeze as we helped out Friends of Felling Park with their post-lockdown spruce up.

It was wonderful to see some OG Goodgymers, Liz and Carol Anne again after our break, and also to see Lauren who achieved her 10th Good Deed today after a long wait due to the lockdown! Liz also achieved 100 Good Deeds through continuing her Coach Visits. Go give them all a cheer!

I arrived a little late but the three ladies were already making themselves at home with a cup of coffee, before we headed up to the top of the park for some planting and weeding. Tim gave us the nice job first of planting some chrysanthemums, marigolds and fuchsia to fill up the empty beds. Then we got to work with hoes and trowels, clearing the weeds from the edge of the grassy areas. Some were pretty tough but we managed to get the whole job done in a couple of hours and had a lovely chat as we made our way round the path.

All swept and tidied, we bid farewell but are sure to be back for another task as there are still lots of jobs Friends of Felling Park would like our help with. Watch this space!

After a successful group run last month at Felling Park we were excited to be invited back to help out for their Great Get Together event.

Upon arriving we looked for Charlie, the task owner, and found her rescuing a lost rabbit. This was especially fitting as part of the event was the "Madhatter's Tea Party". It was just a shame that the bunny didn't have a waistcoat or pocket watch...

Charlie explained what we could do to help out. It wasn't 'painting the roses red' but instead we swiftly got to work tidying the paths up of debris. The three of us - Andrew, Amy and I - made quick work of it to ensure that the park would be ready for the start of the event; Andrew being the height of efficiency with two brushes. It was shame we couldn't stay for jam tarts with the Red Queen, but we all had to head off (before she actually declared 'off with your heads!')

We're sure that this will become one of our favourite organisations to help out- especially as we were offered tea and food (we only took the tea, fearful of potential growth or shrinkage, and there were no dormice to be found!)

Once you're wet, you're wet!

It has rained on and off alllllllllll day- classic Bank Holiday weather. As you can see by the photo of Evan, it didn't stop the Bank Holiday picnic going ahead and 6 GoodGymers braved the elements to play frisbee in Jesmond Dene where Evan also brought along a half-rolled Swiss roll that looked like a baby. I must have checked my phone a hundred times today waiting for the forecast to improve, or for the task to be cancelled but the rain stayed, and so did the task so it was Plan A and all systems GO!

We were so lucky to be joined by GoodGym tourist Jo who's a regular face at GoodGym Portsmouth a born and bred Geordie who now lives in the south, Jo was visiting her family for Bank Holiday and used the opportunity to do both a Community Mission yesterday and the group run tonight. Proper dedication or what?! As it was a longer run this evening we had a very brief intro before heading out into the great Bank Holiday Monsoon of the Toon.

Routemaster Pro Paul was back at the group tonight - yay!- and we had a brand new route to keep us occupied as we battled the rain out on our almost 5K route to Gateshead. The task tonight was at Felling Park which is just behind the Age UK Dementia Hub where we have helped out a few times this year. We'd been asked a while ago to help out the Friends of Felling Park, a group of volunteers who regularly help out with maintaining gardening tasks in the huge park. Carol Anne had arranged this for us, and Pete the task owner said he'd love to have us along regularly so we were ready to impress! Well done Carol Anne for hooking this one up. As with so many of our great tasks, this was at a park I didn't even know existed before tonight.

Our task this evening was simple but important: dig and turn the flower beds over, take the weeds out and prepare them ready for a visit by 60 school children who are going to the park on a trip next week to plant flowers (hopefully when it's drier!) Pete was super-prepared, with tools ready and waiting for us in one of the best organised tool sheds we've ever seen. We did our best to ignore the rain and crack on with the job, getting muddy too, to add to the glamour! Pete was so impressed with what we got done in just 25 minutes and said we'd be welcome back at any of the future volunteer days as well as at another task.

Result!

We kept a brilliant pace back to Hotel Indigo and I was so impressed to learn it was Gwyneth's longest run to date so far. Pop along to her [profile] and give her a cheer- she smashed it! Unsurprisingly as we were half-drowned there was no after-run social as we dashed off in favour of hot baths and central heating instead. I am so impressed with the energy and dedication from everyone tonight- check out the trophy in the Group Photo which was obviously for Worst Task Conditions Ever, and yet we all kept smiling.

There's a Community Mission tomorrow evening led by Andrew. While this task meets at Hotel Indigo, please note it isn't a Group Run and therefore we won't have access to the usual facilities. Please arrive ready to run if you are taking part.

I'm still waiting for some details to be confirmed ahead of our first Group Run with Sustrans next week so I will update you in this week's email.

Have a great week- hopefully the rain, rain will go away!

Anji x