A dozen GoodEggs headed out from Mud Dock to meet five more at Bramble Hill Farm to help Chris and Kim (and Addie) with some weeding, pole-driving, and moving of mulch.

Phill, Matt, Gary, Guido, and newcomer Augusto drove poles in so a plot could be netted; Kim, Sarah, Natalie, Art, and David weeded the raspberries while the geese took a gander through the fence; and Sarah, Dave, Russ, Chris, and Pauline (and Addie) did mulch moving of earth around with wheelbarrows.

We stopped for a quick cake-break and picked some goose and hen eggs with Chris (Russ will hen-ceforth be known as Chicken Whisperer; Natalie got locked in with the geese, and Augusto left his first GoodGym task with some free eggs).

Good luck to Matt on his 29 mile recovery race at Race the Tide tomorrow in Devon.

Saturdays have got HUGE. An awe-inspiring 27 people arrived at Mud Dock for our run today, including 4 new members and 3 DBS checks. This is absolutely fantastic. In fact, if you were to look up the definition of 'fantastic' in the Oxford English Dictionary then this would be it.

With such a large number, I was really pleased that Dave volunteered to lead a group although it turned out that his advertised 'steady' pace was actually pretty quick and the groups blended together especially nicely on the return leg down the cycle path where there was a red river of Goodgym shirts flowing beautifully down the hill.

Our task for today was to help out at the Haven. The Haven offers people who have issues around their mental health and/or drug/alcohol misuse their own safe space where they can relax, socialise and be involved with activity's such as gardening,art,sculpture, woodworking and nature conservation.The Haven is a service user led project- everybody involved has the opportunity to plan,develop and maintain the project.

On arrival we were met by Julia and led to where we were to dig a channel so that the existing water pipe could be run below the surface from one side of the space to the other. Alistair gave us a quick demonstration of the correct spade technique and then people spaced out along the length of the hose working towards each other.

Since we had so many people today we also had two groups working to clear brambles - in one case opening up a path from the top of the site down to the bottom of the hill so access would be a bit easier as the weather starts to improve.

Now, Chris suggested that maybe I was a bit too busy taking photos today rather than getting my hands dirty but in my defence I have to say it was an amazing spectacle to observe. Comments about how we were like locusts - but good locusts - were pretty much spot on as 27 people, many of whom had never met before worked in perfect harmony to finish digging the channel and clear the path, smiling and chatting happily as they did so. I know that Julia and Alistair were really amazed - this would have taken them weeks, so well done everyone.

On return to base we took a moment to celebrate marvellous Clo reaching 100 good deeds - and of course to pass on the GG Bristol centurion outfit to its new owner. Well done Clo - and thanks for bringing all the party snacks - but can you sit at our table with them next time ;) ?

PS Don't forget to log your run today on Strava or RunKeeper so it counts towards our monthly total. If you have Strava and forgot to record it you can add it manually as we all did 8.7km today! And if you haven't yet linked Strava or RunKeeper to your GG account you can do it here

The early morning rain had eased off by the time we got to Roll for the Soul, a couple of us having already visited Eastville parkrun either to help Mel out with some volunteering or else to run the course.

Steph had joined us for the morning and she had brought along some of her Goodgym calendars. These feature various Goodgym runners on tour around the world and would make a nice Christmas present - with any proceeds split between a cancer charity and Goodgym. I'll have a few with me on Tuesday if you would like one.

It was a lovely surprise to also be joined by Kim with Chris taking on child care duties for the morning. Kim had joined us for a while at the Berry Maze and Bramble farm, but it was great to have her join us for the whole run out today - welcome back, Kim!

The warm-up featured a new film review segment with everyone revealing their last watch. No doubt favourable conclusions could be drawn about the personality types of GG members when the most-watched turned out to be Paddington!

Its always a long run out to Manor Woods valley, but it was a little longer still today as we slipped past our usual orchard location and headed up the woodland path for some coppicing.

Martin was a great host as always and gave us some guidance on how best to tackle the hazel and ash growth in our little clearing. We were using loppers, pruning saws and a bow saw and Martin explained that the best way to cut was with a 45 degree slope away from the centre of the stool (stump area) so that water could run off away from the cut branches. He also showed us how to nick the outside first so that the bark remained in-tact after cutting and the tree could be better protected against disease.

Apparently we were to see ourselves as beavers - with loppers taking the place of sharp teeth; managing the forest by allowing hazel to grow back in more useful strong and compact lengths. A quick glance at Chris following this statement indicated that with "saw"s and "beavers", the pun was in the bag, however having had time to reflect on the fact that I tend to share these reports around a little more widely now I've made the call that maybe it wouldn't quite receive the required GG certificate for family viewing.

Moving on ...

Some of us split into pairs to take on the coppicing while others took the remaining loppers to tackle a little bramble growth. The coppicers took on some large specimens and all around were calls of 'Timber' as some satisfying felling took place, with runners posing proudly by their hazel specimens in a manner similar to a sea fisherman and his prize catch. Steph also seemed to enjoy the opportunity to work out a little pent-up aggression with the aid of a bow saw and a hazel trunk.

This was a fun task and it was even harder than usual to tear people away today, so even with a rather brisk run back we were a little late arriving back at base. Apologies for that - but hopefully everyone enjoyed themselves today and I look forward to seeing you all again soon!

It never rains at Goodgym. (Well apart from that one time with the HelpfulPeeps leaflets, oh and that Stackpool road job with the Patchwork project ..)

It almost never rains at Goodgym.

And tonight was no exception. After raining continuously all day, it stopped for us tonight

So after welcoming our new recruits (fantastic to meet you!) we split into two groups and headed off to St Paul's Adventure playground. Guy and Rachel of the APE project are doing an amazing job of making this brilliant playground shine again - and had enlisted our help.

Rachel had promised there would be lots to do for all 30 of us - and she was true to her word!

Team one were set to work raking up leaves in the ball court.

Team two had to scrub the main gate with wire brushes, sand paper and sugar soap to prepare them for painting (they'll look brilliant when they're done!)

Team three were tasked with moving the contents of the downstairs room into the mezzanine above for storage. Unfortunately the hoist is broken so it would have taken Rachel a long time to carry each item up the ladder!

After 30 minutes ...

Team one had not only swept the ball court, they had gone rogue, sweeping up leaves wherever they could find them, amassing 5 or 6 bags full of them and making the paths a lot less slippery in the process.

Team two had done loads on the gates and were quite hard to entice back inside when it was time to go, they were so intent on finishing the whole gate!

And team three managed to finish moving all the items so that the room space was all clear.

You're all brilliant.

Fourteen of us headed off to monthly eats where Caroline took on social photo duties (thanks for the potatoes!) and I realized I had forgotten to promote our social on Friday - do go along if you can!

Thanks to Tim for the pun.

Refreshed from a bank holiday a massive group of ravishing runners met at Vivo to help tidy up Spring Hill with Incredible Edible and the yard at Emmaus.

20 runners came with me (Gary) to Emmaus. We ran around a mile to get there before being greeted by the ever smiling Xanne. She gave us an introduction and explained that our task would be a little different from the usual. Today we were to sort through all of the donated items that were put into the yard as they were deemed trashier than a romantic airport novel cover being read aloud by Oscar the Grouch. We were put to work smashing furniture, tearing fabric from mattresses, smashing electrical equipment to separate the plastic and metal parts and tool sorting.

New runners Roanna and Guido worked alongside veteran and recent conqueror of the Matahorn Ultra Madahorn Matt to sort a plethora of tools. While the electronics team had a smashing time a really swept the floor with their dance routines. But biggest shout goes out to the team taking on the task of removing the fabric from a mattress that had every spring individually wrapped. Needless to say they did not quite have enough time but we will be back to finish the job.

After finishing up and leaving Xanne happy with our work we ran back to Queen Square for a game of Chicken Otter Badger before stretching out.

On root to snow berry who's boss

The remaining 10 runners joined Hannah of Incredible Edible to mercilessly destroy the (superficially appealing) snowberries that were taking up valuable edible space that could be used for planting tasty food.

The 10 surely did the work of 20 and after haf an hour snowberry remains littered the path. Special kudos to Sophie who managed to break off one of the prongs on her fork in her enthusiasm and to the Godfather who totally laid waste to a particularly tough snowberry root.

Farewell from Goodgym Bristol to Louis who is heading home after finishing his job in Bristol. Hope to see you on the Birmingham run report soon, Louis!

Thanks for a great evening guys. It was hot and humid but you smashed it putting the jobs to bed no problem a-tool. Snow runder our task hosts reallly dig what we do and root for us all the way!

See you next time!