On a balmy June Monday evening, 5 GoodGymers collected 10ish bags of discarded litter and waste.

Stefanie, Sam, Pavel, and Ben strolled from St Peter's Square via the Bridgewater Hall canal path to Hulme Park, collecting all sorts on the way:

• bottles, cans, drinks cartons 🥫
• vapes, air pods 📢
• cardboard packaging 📦
• takeaway waste 🗑

With 4 full sacks collected, and some litter hotspots identified, we met Gaynor in Hulme park, sporting her GoodGym t-shirt for the 1st time 😀

We made a loop around Hulme park, having a go on the swing and impressed with the relative lack of litter given the warm picnic-friendly weather. We did find a suitcase, some more clothing and empty money bags in the park, plus other litter, while keeping to the shade given the heat 🥵.

Litter bags were collated, location saved, and will be reported (some again) to Keep MCR Tidy for collection.

Good stroll and litter pick in the sun 🌞

Back in Oxford to help with the warm up and timekeeping at Florence Park junior parkrun event #223. Only 94 juniors this week with warm temperatures and cruk race for life going on in the city centre.

Lots of good runners and plenty volunteers.

Juno and I helped with tail walking at University Parks parkrun event #175. 591 runners and walkers completed the 5 km 2-lap course. We were joined by Sarah from Bristol with quite a lot of latecomers too!

Dusty and warm. Nice run there beforehand.

Welcome to Megha and Olawale for their first GoodGym outing! Kudos for getting out to help today, particularly Olawale coming from Wigan 💪

Today, we were helping out the Friends of Peel Park tidy up following Salford Pride the previous day. Some of the gating and stalls were still up from what sounded like a good day, despite the long queues at the bar! 🏳️‍🌈

We collected 12 or 13 sacks of rubbish, mostly of cans, bottles, raffle tickets 🎟 and confetti 🎊. We found a football too, that a local made use of, and made a really good job removing litter from the playground that looks much more welcoming now 😀

Salford City Council's litter picker locker is really handy too, apparently being well used (and thankfully not abused or damaged) so locals can pick up litter when walking. Little and often really does help 🚮

Gaynor and Ben made the ~3 km walk from Manchester city centre there and back 👣 and thankfully, the rain steered clear 🌧 so we didn't get too wet.

Juno and Ben helped out at Fletcher Moss parkrun event #253. We ran and checked the course, helped with the setting up and clearing up, and marshalled at Old Bedians marshal point 5.

446 runners and walkers completed the 5 km route on a hot solstice morning.

Let me begin.

Peter, completing his 20th Good Deed, and Ben raided the cupboards and the shops to take much needed items to a food bank collection point at Asda in Hulme for Manchester South-Central food bank. In all we donated:

• tinned meat 🥩
• tinned fruit and veg 🥕🍍
• rice 🍚
• rice pudding
• UHT milk 🥛
• long life juice
• tinned beans 🫘 and spaghetti 🍝
• plastic bags (always handy to re-use)
• peanut butter 🥜

The trolley was well filled once we had unloaded, and the run 🏃‍♂️ back was certainly much lighter and quicker! We had a quick stop at Parakeet Parkway on the way 🦜

We'll have another donation drive before the summer holidays in July too, so keep an eye out for that.

We came to do good, we came to do good, so get out your seat and run around... (I'll work on it)