3 GoogdGymers helped Pam prepare planters for new flowers, to be put in by Colchester in Bloom on Thursday morning (meeting at 10 am in town if anyone would be interested in helping them).

Once we had established where the "Bus Park" was (more commonly referred to as the Bus Station), we set to work removing significant amounts of old soil from the planters, and then losening the remaining soil so that new plants could be easily placed with new nutritious soil around them. It was more challenging than it initially appeared as some of the soil was so dry and compressed that those of us who stood down wind of the planters regularly received a face full of soil every time a new chunk was removed.

We lamented the lack of broom a few times when we surveyed the mess we were making, but we were pretty confident the weather would do the necessary clean up job before anyone could return with one in the morning.

Many apologies for the lack of quality pun!

Blessed with another sunny evening, despite Ella's 4 layers of clothing, we assembled as a strong team of six tonight and did a litterpick loop of town. Rowan's early find of random cables at the bottom of Balkerne hill was probably the choice find, and her diligent efforts got her the gold star for most litter collected.

On warm evenings its nice to make our neighborhoods nicer, drawing compliments from a few passers by, and we can all catch up and chat about Eurovision, left handedness and our memories of the Queen's death.

Following some litter collected we stopped off at Turtle Bay for some refreshments and snacks, our first social in two years! nice to see new members coming on board and getting a chance to chat without litterpickers in hand.

Back to the high St next week for Colchester in Bloom!

Another pleasant evening in our early summer saw five Goodgymmers greeted by a blast of crooner classics outside the Mercury theatre. After a casual stroll to the high st we met Pam and got to work clearing the flower beds, with a few different challenges to meet.

There was preserving some flowers, removing others and then removing the weedy soil altogether, limited by bags and their weight. Some chat about archeology as we discovered how deep those flower beds go, sadly nothing but glass shards uncovered by our team.

Following the task we loaded up Pam's car (after she demonstrated her impressed strength!) then unloaded them at her home too, a thorough job that will need a follow up soon.

Join us next week for some post-task drinks in town!

On a pleasant sunny Sunday morning, 8 GoodGymers, plus families, helped to cheer on, encourage and keep safe 98 young runners as they completed two laps of Old Heath Rec. It was lovely to meet Damon (with my sincere apologies for doubting your existence) and Alice for the first time.

It was great to then have time to catch up while sitting in the sun / running after young children.

Look at for another opportunity to marshal the Junior Park Run again soon as they are always very grateful for our support.

Its foodbank time! and for the first time in ages its light and warm so our 4 goodgymmers were in a good mood.

After walking, running and cycling down we set to work on sweeping, mopping and generally tidying the foodbank floor, whilst catching up on our various busy lives. There was then some sort of carelessness with the buckets and we did an additional task of mopping up our own mess whilst snagging a mop in the racks, i still dont really know how that all happened.

job thoroughly done and everything looking shiny, we uncovered Gigi is soon to get married - many congratulations! Plenty going on in the coming months, including a whole stack of Goodgym tasks.