☀️ In contrast to the torrentially wet weather for last Monday’s group run, tonight was pleasantly sunny. 26 of us gathered, bound for West Bank Park.

👋 We were thrilled to welcome Iñaki for his first GoodGym session, and Beth for her first group run. We hope you both had fun!

🦸‍♂️ We were also delighted to celebrate Paul Kelly’s 300th good deed, giving him the honour of wearing the special cape of joy (and celebrating further with him at the pub at the end of the task!)

🇪🇺 We named, numbered and warmed up while saying our favourite European country (in honour of Eurovision so Australia featured, obviously!) Spain, Italy and Ireland were popular choices, along with Yorkshire (of course it should be a country).

🏃‍♀️🚲🚶‍♂️We then headed to West Bank Park, on foot or bike where we were greeted by Kristina who had a plethora of tasks for us.

👑 We split into two main groups for pond vs pruning. The pruning was due to be around Queen Victoria, to uncover her. So the first question was “Where is Queen Victoria?”, followed by “Where is her nose?”, followed by “When’s her next bath?” (not for a while yet apparently as she had one last year and is likely to go fully green before her next!) Anyway, the team cracked on with some pruning, very efficiently, so they were soon finished and onto the next task.

🌼They then headed to a lovely meadowy area, with strict instructions to take care of the two bluebells there. There were various jobs in there, including pulling up dock leaves (which means we got to hear about Carl’s delicious-sounding stuffed dock leaves, and then Kristina’s equally delicious-sounding wild garlic birthday risotto!) The other job was trimming the new hedge/border back, using the 3 Ds principles - pruning dead, damaged and diseased in that order.

🐸 Meanwhile, the pond area was a hive of activity (literally - the pond itself was teeming with life, which was lovely to see - frogs and tadpoles galore!) The GoodGymmers were pretty busy too, weeding the dreaded ground elder from the flowerbed edges. Pete took his shoes and socks off immediately and waded into the pond (I’m not entirely sure why, possibly to retrieve a plant that needed moving?)

🌿 Another group were doing complicated manoeuvring with some wie to protect a newly-created hedge. Meanwhile, Beth, Leanne, Martin B were busy chopping out something beginning with P (we quickly forgot what) from within a large holly tree. They made a huge difference very quickly and then moved the cuttings to create a barrier for the pond.

💪 SO much got done this evening so thank you very much to everyone. And that was before the fitness! We did triple jump-based relays where everyone had to run, hop, skip and jump in turn to see which team could do it the fastest. There was some incredibly impressive stuff and thank you everyone for getting stuck in with what was a slightly more hardcore fitness session compared to some recently.

📸 As it turned out I’d forgotten to take the group photo, we did that then, and headed back to base. Once there, we cooled down, stretched off and parted ways. Oh, and we even avoided the brooding threat of rain that was lurking for the run back 🥳

🙌 Thank you everyone, I hope you have a great week and hopefully see you soon!

*Credit to Carl for the pun 👍

☔️ 7 incredibly dedicated GoodGymmers gathered on a rainy (coronation) bank holiday Monday evening for this evening’s group run. We were thrilled to welcome Sheila for her first group room and Dan for his first since 2019 👋

🌳 I was also able to share some incredibly exciting news about a Tiny Forest that we’re hoping to get started soon, having just had a meeting about it.

📜 Anyway, on to the task (literally) in hand, which was leafletting for the Community Furniture Store. They’d left an incredibly hefty box of leaflets for us to distribute to various studenty locations across the city 👩‍🎓👨‍🎓

3️⃣ We split into three groups:

🎒 Abigail, Martin and Sheila covered the city centre and walked an impressive almost 4 miles, with somewhat mixed luck as some accommodation blocks (apparently the fancier ones) declined their kind offer of leaflets. Abigail and Sheila managed to offer theirs out whilst Martin kindly carried the spares in his backpack.

🏃‍♀️ Lucy and Jenna jogged east to Tang Hall and also had somewhat mixed luck, more related to some possibly incorrect addresses that had been provided.

📚 Dan and I headed towards York University, where we left lots at the Information Centre (though sadly had less luck at the library). We also stopped at various places on the way there and back.

😁 It stopped raining eventually and we gathered back at CVS, soggy but (impressively) still smiling! And full of ideas of where to distribute the remaining leaflets.

👍 Incredible work everyone, leafletting on a rainy bank holiday evening may not be everyone’s idea of fun so you’re absolute troopers 💪