This week’s GoodGym mission took us to the local allotments for a proper workout with purpose! Our task: clear out an impressive pile of soil and compost from the old bays to make room for a shiny new set of composting stations.

Two GoodGymers teamed up with 7 allotment plot holders for the challenge — digging, lifting, wheelbarrowing, and laughing our way through it. It was the sort of job that gives the legs and arms a run for their money, but with plenty of friendly chat and encouragement along the way.

In just two hours we’d helped shift load after load onto nearby plots and cleared a big chunk of space for phase two of the project. The gardeners were delighted, the compost is now destined for good use, and we left with that classic GoodGym combo: muddy shoes, warm hearts, and pleasantly tired muscles.

There’s more to do to finish the new composting bays, so we’ll be back — and we’d love more people to join us! If you fancy getting fit while doing good in the community (no gardening experience required!), this is the perfect mission. Come along for fresh air, friendly faces, and a workout that really makes a difference 🌱💪

A bright beautiful morning! Today we helped Val at Northcliffe Allotments while listening to the birds singing and chirping. Very calming while we got some hard work done.

Overgrown tree branches were cut down and bramble cut back in preparation for winter.

Bugs house was filled in with branches and leaves and an excess of branches and bramble moved into a pile for bonfire night on winter solstice.

GoodGym Bradford returns to Northcliffe Community Garden supporting the allotment team to prepare for an early bonfire night tonight.

The rain nearly stopped play but at the time of action the sky cleared up.

We cut back trees and bushes. Piled them up to add fuel to the fire. Also we prepared the flower beds to help plant bulbs later in a few weeks.

It involved a lot of muscle power but very therapeutic indeed.

Sadly the mission was rained off due to Storm Amy. I was still given a tour of the community garden and orchard and there's plenty of work to do for intrepid GoodGymers. Look out for another mission at the Community Garden soon.

Another trip to the Northcliffe Community Garden and another chance to attack the big dirt mountain and continue turning it into a rock garden.

New member Keira joined us and got stuck in to the task. Rachel had done a great job previously with the mound but the recent weather had led to an explosion of doc leaves, nettles, thistles and bindweeds.

It was hard work to get the weeds out all the way to the roots but our work was rewarded with tea and biscuits. We then attacked the larger weeds with the mattocks and realised using those earlier would have made lighter work of task. But wheres the fun in that??

For the last twenty minutes we covered most of the area we had cleared with stones that should prevent some of the weeds coming back and make the mound much more pleasant to look at. Plenty more to do though so we'll be back again next month 😁

Our return trip to the Northcliffe Community Garden saw new member Hikesh complete his first task and more progress on the rockery and clearing the paths and features.

The community garden was looking great and we could really see the difference by the end.