This week, GoodGymers Catherine, Daiana and Alan headed to Fox Den Allotment for an evening of gardening, wildlife spotting and plenty of hard work! 💪🏼

This was my first visit to Fox Den, and the 10th good deed with GoodGym! I was pleased to see the nice work done there and I could also learn a lot about gardening, plants, medical effects of the plants and how rich and diverse the environment can be! 🌳

Our first task was creating a hedgehog highway. 🦔 We cleared an area before carefully layering some logs, smaller branches, twigs and finally leafy cuttings on top to create the perfect habitat for our prickly visitors. Alan’s strength and speedy log-moving certainly made light work of the heaviest part of the job! 🪏

Following this first move, we turned our attention to preparing a bed that will become part of the site’s growing forest garden. We learned how these gardens become increasingly self-sustaining over time, with established fruit trees and bushes already thriving. After turning the soil into a rich, nutritious bed ready for planting, it will soon be home to raspberries, artichokes, strawberries and plenty of other perennial plants. 🌱

As if that wasn’t enough, we also shifted some hefty rubber sheets into place to cover borders that had been overtaken by weeds. The sheets will help suppress the weeds over the coming months, leaving the beds ready for even more planting later in the year.

There was plenty of wildlife to enjoy too! We spotted a tiny cricket, rescued a thirsty bee with a well-timed drink of water, and a ladybird seemed particularly fond of Alan’s T-shirt – a very fitting companion for the evening. 🦗🐞

A brilliant evening of teamwork, learning and getting stuck in. We can’t wait to see how Fox Den continues to grow over the coming seasons! ✨

It was another scorcher in Cambridge, so we pivoted our group run to a shady fitness session in the park.

Scott and I kicked off with all the classics - squats, lunges and planks, before Beth joined just in time for abs. Mid-bicycle kick, we noticed Alan about to cycle past, but the lure of the red t-shirts was too much. At this point we'd all shifted to stretching, enjoying some slower movement in the fresh air.

We headed over to Jimmy's to meet Blessings and Marie, who joined us for her first session 👋

Unfortunately, the task couldn't go ahead, but we all agreed to do a good deed locally over the next week. There will be litter picking, Foodbank and charity shop donations.

With the gift of time, we took the opportunity for some more fresh air in the park and walked back to our shady spot, which by this point had a very enjoyable breeze. We spent a balmy hour catching up, finding out everyone's favourite parkrun (not an easy task), uncovering historic connections, and trying to work out the terrier breed that is around 30kg - bigger than a Pitbull and smaller than a fat Dalmatian. Alan, if you find out you must share, so we can all sleep easy.

As the evening cooled, we headed our separate ways, walking, running and cycling across the city.

Not quite the evening we had planned, but in true GoodGym style, we found the silver lining and prioritised movement and connection 🫶

🎉 Happy 1 year to Cambridge GoodGym! 🎉

This week marks a year of doing good in Cambridge and we met to celebrate. We love doing good for the community, and tonight was all about a bit of good for the lovely people who make it happen. ♥️

We headed to Cambridge's board room cafe, but we were chatting so much, we didn't get round to playing any games. We heard tales of climbing Mount Fuji, discussed the impacts of poverty on wellbeing, and of course debriefed the traitors final! Quite the eclectic mix.

TaskForce met early to do a little bit of planning, whilst indulging in some delicious milkshakes. It was then great to welcome newer GoodGymers and get to know each other better as Cambridge GoodGym goes from strength to strength.

✨ 1 year on from our first Community Mission in Cambridge, we look forward to what the next year holds!🙌