It was the GoodGym Central team's away day on Wednesday, and while high-minded philosophising and strategising has its place (lord don't I love the sound of my own voice at times), GoodGym is at its best when it is all about getting things done.

So after a pit-stop for lunch we (that is most of us who hadn't also ordered dessert and stayed at the restaurant) hot-tailed it across to St George the Martyr Church to help the Borough Food Cooperative team with a range of tasks.

Some of the team hit the kitchen, sorting, packing and putting away a range of foodstuffs, including a mountain of potatoes and possibly the largest collection of Lurpak containers I have ever seen. Given their cost these days, it genuinely looked like a Fort Knox's worth of buttery bullion.

Another group was tasked with giving the outside and entrance to the church a bit of spruce up, clearing up weeds, tidying flower pots and beds, sweeping up dust and cobwebs and generally giving the place a fresher feel. It must have worked as two passers-by asked if they could come and sit in the adjacent garden, and enjoy the sun trap. Their leisurely catch up clearly had an effect as we ended up covering a range of topics ourselves as we worked, including:

• AI... far too much AI chat
• Future evolution of humanity
• Writing books and gender representation in thriller writing
• Marketing budgets
• GoodGym partnerships to maintain walk and cycle ways across the UK

So there were some work conversations at least.

Jack, Jacob and Chalomi were also given the oddly Victorian sound task of shuttling bags of coal down to the nearby rectory house. Reports from their adventures indicate this was a far more sweaty and awkward job than expected due to an antagonistic trolley, but anyone who knows these wannabe Dickensian street urchins will also know that it'll take more than incompliant wheels to spoil their GoodGym-ing fun.

As we gathered for a final photo, we were met with the loveliest of feedback from the people running the project and the impact we made, putting us in the perfect headspace to go get an ice-cream (and do some more planning work obviously).

Awaydays should be about bringing people together around common values and goals - that also happens to be something GoodGym is perfect at and indeed it was the perfect way to share time, ideas and experiences with each other.

The Shindig 2026 Sunday walk had something for everyone, combining history and nature along 5km of trails around YHA National Forest. With nods to the area's industrial past in a beautiful countryside setting, 25 GoodGymers joined for a very mindful morning.

We walked through Conkers, along the Ashby Canal, past Moira Furnace and around Donisthorpe Woodland Park, before heading along part of the Ashby Woulds Heritage Trail (a disused railway) back to base.

The highlight was stumbling across a Living History Camp as part of an event at Moira Furnace Museum. As well as a history lesson, we got a snapshot of the more simple parts of wartime life. Not something you see every day!

Good movement, good time in nature, and good connection, what better way to round up another beautiful GoodGym Shindig weekend 💛

With extra hands this morning, the Open Table setup was finished in record time so one of the team found extra jobs and headed outside to clean the windows. There was even time for coffee.