We gathered outside the closed Waterloo Café on a cold, clear, crisp February evening, and Heetu led us in a warm up. Whilst attempting a new kind of stretch which involved a lot of (for some of us, inelegant) balancing, a local walking past kindly suggested we just go for a run, and seemed surprised with the reply “We’re about to do just that!”

Despite the specific instruction “Please bring torches as it will be dark on the beach”, clearly laid out on the task listing, 3 out of 5 of us forgot our torches so we were sharing the light and relying on the moonlight. Despite running in the darkness, remarkably we only made one wrong turn: when the squelching underfoot got significantly louder, we realized we were heading around the wrong lake, but no problem – we simply headed back and course-corrected on the right path.

Being on the beach on a clear crisp night was a beautiful experience, the stars were so bright, and Liam pointed out planets and constellations to us: we identified Jupiter, Venus & Mars, and how The Plough led to the North Star.

In the darkness it was surprisingly difficult to spot the famous Iron Men on Crosby Beach, part of Anthony Gormley’s Another Place art installation. Sian was the first person to spot one, and the group challenged themselves to keep running until each person correctly identified one.

Shoutout to Lucian who didn’t let an injury stop him from joining, he undertook a moonlight walk, and was never far away from the runners who kept stopping to (unsuccessfully) take photographs of the beautiful night sky.

After a gentle 2.5k it was time to turn back, and the return journey felt much quicker sans-lake detour. The group then headed to a local pub for dinner, and discussed all the activities and challenges they were interested in for the coming year.

It was a lovely evening and a unique experience, combining a fabulous moonlit beach run with dinner with friends. All present agreed there’ll be more of this to come!

This Monday we were back are Park Lane with Elaine from Urban Green Up, helping to lay mulch on the site to avoid the weeds taking over. Elaine was expecting some contractors the very next day so we had to work swiftly to ensure the site was ready for them to start work.

Upon arrival Elaine couldn't wait to show us her new toy - a foldable trolley! This really came in handy with transporting the mulch from the huge pile on the street (the pictures really don't do it justice!) to the other end of the site where it was needed.

We split into teams with one team shoveling and moving bags of mulch and the other raking the mulch out to cover the necessary areas.

We didn't quite manage to move all of the mulch but the sight was looking much neater by the time we left. Well done everyone - we can't wait to see what the summer brings for his amazing space!

Sallyann enticed us all to come to parkrun by announcing that if you attend all 12 Goodgym parkrun sessions in the year, as a runner or volunteer or even a breakfaster, there will be a mystery prize. This drew lots of us in, including Liam even though he was setting off for Costa Rica later in the day! Sallyann, Lucien and Pauline came to cheer on and photograph Liam, Bekah, Ellie, Julie, and Sian who joined a huge crowd of enthusiastic runners, numbers probably swelled by New Year Resolutions to a total of 669. It was Goodgymmer Eileen's 100th session as a parkrun volunteer, an amazing achievement. A special shout-out also goes to Heetu who wasn't able to join us as she was doing a trail run on the Llyn Peninsula. After the run we went to escape the cold in a cafe for brunch, arriving at Espresso on Park Road moments before the shutters went up for the day so that it felt like it was opening just for us. We're experimenting with a new nearby cafe for brunch each month, and February might see us heading to Lodge Lane. We had a lovely chat and catch-up and are looking forward to the next task!

On Thursday a gang of Goodgymers met at Crown park armed with litter-pickers and a plan. Unlike previous similar tasks in the past, this time we decided to mix up the fitness and the cleaning in a relay format, with different groups taking turns to either pick litter or do fitness exercises, switching every 10 minutes or so. Prepared with resistance bands as well as our running shoes, Sallyann led us with some great strength exercises, and by the end of the session we had gathered two full bags of litter...pretty good considering the light conditions. We even had a few attempts on the local gym equipment, with some hanging, and pull-ups to round off the session.
A fun new take on an old Goodgym formula, I'm sure we'll try more sessions like this in the future, especially as the days grow longer and warmer..!