After a week of autumnal gloom a sunny evening brought a bumper turn out of runners to East Oxford.

With one eye on the clock so that we could make it through the gate to the University Parks before locking up time, we got the run briefing underway early. Double garlands of joy were awarded this week, as both Rachael and Trev had raced at Blenheim Palace in awful conditions on Sunday. Soggy socks and blisters definitely deserve an award! We're always delighted to welcome new Oxford GoodGymers, and tonight we had a hat-trick joining us for their first Oxford Good Deeds; lovely to meet you Tom, Peter, and Callum. And with no further ado....

...we were off!!

Dodging freshers week madness in South Park we dashed past the Islamic Centre and made a beeline for Mesopotamia Walk, sliding through the gate just as it was locked behind us. It was worth it to squeeze in one last evening group run on the trails before autumn and winter restrict us to the tarmac! A beautiful run along the river, and a brief distraction on the zip wire (Sarah showing us how it's done), lead us to Raymund Road and a large pile of daffodil bulbs.

The plan by Councillor Mark Lygo is to plant spring bulbs along every grass verge in Marston over the next 18 months, to add a splash of joy and colour to the area (a use of his councillor priority fund that will make a big visual impact on the area come the spring). Our task was to get the project started by planting the length of Raymund Road, which is the main route to St Nicholas's Primary School. Instructions received from Mark, and tools kindly supplied by Alistair from Marston Community Gardens, we split into pairs, grabbed spades and bulbs, and set to work.

Half an hour and hundreds of daffodil bulbs later (and only one pogo-stick tumble; always guaranteed some fun when Aoife's around) we had planted along the length of the road, with clusters under the couple of trees at the end of the street. We'll be keen to return in March to check out the flowers! As an unexpected prize for helping out we were gifted a jar of honey by Alistair, which had to be awarded to Rachel for coming back to her first Group Run post-injury tonight, and completing her 10th Good Deed!

With darkness crowding in and an autumnal chill in the air we stashed the tools and got moving again on the run back to base. The road route is far less scenic, but with lots of chat it was still plenty of fun. Well it was until we got to South Park with 10 minutes to spare.......HILLS! HILLS! HILLS! It's so rare to find a hill in Oxford that when you do you're obligated to run a few relay hill sprints. Them's the rules.

Great work once again team.

Same time next week.

“You can’t possibly do anything if you think you can’t. But you can do impossible things sometimes, if you think you can.” Enid Blyton

It had been a grey week, and the Tremendous Twelve had been trapped indoors watching the rain trickle down the window panes for days. All the plans for the summer hols were trickling away. And suddenly they remembered all in a rush what day it was! "It's Wednesday - and it's Goodgym night!" they said to themselves, and their legs fizzed with joy.

The Children's Allotment had looked thrilling enough on the night they had seen it before - but now, in the June breeze, it seemed an enchanting place to explore. As they drew near to it, and saw the trees in the orchard heavy with fruit and heard the call of blackbirds, the Tremendous Twelve gazed in delight. Nothing but trees and nettles, birds and woven hazel fencing. Now that it was almost completely bramble free oh, what a lovely allotment, all for their very own! (Or, for 45 minutes of volunteering.)

Donning gardening gloves, and sharing out tools, the gang were soon hard at work. With studious concentration they de-tangled bindweed from hedgerow and hazel, sorted plastic from metal for the skip, and removed plastic cones from edible hedgerow plants. Meanwhile Alya and Sarah were on a treasure hunt, and with great excitement called the others over to help identify their finds. The gang solemnly agreed it was definitely Pirate Gold (Jackie Annual 1982).

"I don’t know why, but getting fit in the outdoors while helping the local community always seems so much nicer than exercising indoors," said Mark.

All of the Tremendous Twelve agreed with Mark, and setting off away from the Children's Allotment they planned to find some more adventures to fill the long summer day. Rounding the corner they discovered some circus folk had taken up residence nearby. "Golly!" exclaimed Alison, "I do wish I could fly through the air like that on the flying trapeze. It looks such tremendous fun!" But lacking training, the appropriate health and safety assessment, and a prior booking, our intrepid adventurers made do with a highly competitive game of frisbee, and acquired a new companion/mascot in the form of a small but determined dog.

As the sun started to dip on a truly satisfying evening, the Tremendous Twelve made their weary way home, delivering a handful of newsletters for Crisis en-route. Home to supper for this Tremendous Twelve.

~With apologies to Enid Blyton for a poor attempt at her style!
~Well done to Alison and Bethan for both completing their 10th Good Deed with Goodgym
~Welcome to Harriet and Katherine, who joined us for the first time.