As it drizzled all day, Sam saw the sign ups for the group run dwindle as the time drew closer to the start of the group run. Tonight's task would take us to Galleywall Nature Reserve, which would be our first group run visit of 2022. There was a session a couple of weekend's ago to tidy up the Nature Reserve after Storm Eunice.

As Sam arrived at Old Spike Roastery, Javier (the manager of Old Spike) was still around and thus, struck a conversation whilst he waited for all the GoodGymers to arrive. There were seven sign ups, but Sam knew one other runner would meet him at the task. As Paulin, Emma, Hollie, James and Benjamin arrived they were offered Baci chocolates by Sam as he recently came back from a weekend in Rome. There were some heart felt messages in the chocolates, but most were cheesy. Since it was planned that tonight would be a longer run, once everyone was in, we rushed out to get warm as the drizzling hadn't stopped!

The two-minute or so warm-up session was followed tonight's ice-breaker question, which was: Tomorrow is St. Patrick's Day, what is your favourite thing to come out of Ireland?

We had leprechauns and leprechauns chasing gold (to be specific), Guinness, Games of Thrones (as it was shot there....Northern Ireland), the Giant Causeway (again, Northern Ireland) and finally, the most heartfelt answer came from Paulin - her sister (as she was born in Ireland).

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Root cause to spawn are frogs

Paulin reminded Sam that the more direct route to Galleywall Nature Reserve via Rye Lane had roadworks, so we had to run a detour route that took us 25 minutes covering over 4k, but we made it on time.

Upon our arrival at Galleywall Nature Reserve, Jane had setup all the tools and gave a quick introduction to the Nature Reserve to those who hadn't been before. She set out three tasks as we were in six and expecting Emma too. In the end, she didn't come, but we got on with all the tasks.

We split the tasks as such:

The first task was to clear a muddy area of stick and stones, raking it out and then poured bags of woodchip which was received from the Paper Garden before this spread/raked all over to cover the muddy area. This task was covered by Hollie and Benjamin, whom took on two other tasks afterwards. They cleared the entrance area of sticks and swept to make the entrance presentable. Finally, they sowed bee-friendly seeds on a mound near the pond. Great effort! 💪 🙌

Paulin and James took on the weeding task. They had to weed Green alkanet (the one with the blue flowers) on the mound where Hollie and Benjamin were planting the bee-friendly seeds. The Green alkanet were transported to a container to break down and where it would be added to a solution, which would be put on any growing plants - it's all cyclical! ♻️

Finally, Emma LOVES litter, didn't know that, but she does. When she heard there was a litter picking task, she jumped at it and had a particular system with her litter picking. With two bags tied to her waist and a headtorch at the ready, she played hide and seek with the litter. More seeking than hiding on her end.

We finished the night with a group photo and we got the chance to see two frogs and frog spawn in the smaller pond. Great to see nature having this safe space to live and grow!

Only Paulin and Emma ran back with Sam as the others lived nearby or the 4k run to Galleywall Nature Reserve was enough. 😉

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out in the rain and for powering through a much longer run than usual to Galleywall Nature Reserve. Thank you!

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Thank You Jane

GoodGym is all about getting fit and doing good! We praise the runners/cyclists/walkers who come to get fit and help out, but we often forget about our task owner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Jane for opening up Galleywall Nature Reserve to us and I am glad we could help out with spreading woodchip, weeding and sowing seeds! See you in the Spring!