Despite a drizzly start, we had a fantastic turnout to yesterday's litter pick and that's proof that the January Challenge is providing some proper motivation! AND six members of the group had volunteered earlier at Hornfair Junior Parkrun so with this session we’ve now officially hit our target of 140 good deeds in January, which is a massive achievement.

Afer an ice breaker discussing our favourite breakfasts, yum, the walking team set off first and arrived ahead of the runners, who in typical GoodGym generosity took it in turns pushing the running buggy. Not an easy task with a whopping four-year-old on board, especially up those hills, but plenty of encouragement and shared effort got us all through it together.

Once everyone arrived, we split into groups and spread out across the Common to tackle the litter. By the end of the session, we’d collected an impressive 26 bags of litter in total. Great work everyone and well done on smashing our good deeds target.

Coming up...

On Wednesday we'll be weeding and doing other odd jobs at St Richard's

On Saturday, as well as our usual Parkruns we've got more litter picking around Sutcliffe Park for our last push on those good deeds!

Until next time, wonderful people!

Rachel

Leafletted Rathmore and Troughton Road to help the campaign raise money to buy the White Swan pub for the local community.

A star-studded cast to celebrate GoodGym Greenwich's 10th Birthday!

An unseasonably mild Sunday morning greeted 18 goodgymers as we made our way to Brooklands school in Kidbrooke. Whilst the school is a little tucked away, the huge grounds provide plenty of outdoor space for the children and their families.

We joined a group of existing volunteers from the school, and were soon wheelbarrowing soil to the growing beds as well as clearing weeds. One of our target areas was an enclosure containing a pond; again involving clearing weeds, bracken and planks to free up the pond area for its proper use. Discovering a few baby dragons* added to the magic of the event, along with a confused toad and lots of ladybirds.

(* thankfully these turned out to be the non-fire breathing variety, which are Newts to us (!) They were carefully looked after by a member of the team to be returned to a safe habitat).

A busy hour soon runs out, so a final group photo provided the icing on the rake for GGG's birthday mission. Special welcome to Iyabo for your first good deed with us - and lovely that you could join us for our lunch to celebrate our birthday!

Coming up...

On Wednesday we're continuing our painting of the hall at Charlton Manor Primary School.

On Sunday we've got our (optional) group run and litter pick on Woolwich Common.

And the following Wednesday we're helping at St Richard's.

Thanks all & see you at the next task! ⭐

It was all about collaboration as 4 GoodGymers joined Clean Up Charlton and the RA 5K Litterpickers for a group walk and litterpick along the Thames Path from Charlton to Woolwich. We got our steps in AND filled 18 bags of litter!

Starting at the Anchor & Hope and doing a bit of a clean up around the front of the pub, we went past the Thames Barrier and through the old industrial estate. It's amazing what you find when you dig around in the back of the bushes - watch out for those flying cans as Ashton goes into the undergrowth to wrestle them out! SO many cans and bottles as we reached Woolwich. We could have filled several more bags but decided to call it a day and warm up with a coffee at Woolwich Works after a good 2 hours work.

Ivar and Felicity were the two GoodGymers to head to Oxleas Woods this morning — which was fitting, as it was also a very crisp two degrees above zero. Luckily, around two dozen equally brave volunteers turned up.

After meeting Christine and the Friends of Oxleas Woodlands by the café, we headed into the woods to get stuck in. Our task: repeatedly ferry hefty, tightly bundled sticks to help raise a dead hedge deeper in the woodland. Lots of walking, lots of carrying, and lots of dogs running around hoping that the sticks were there to play fetch with.

It turned out to be quite a good workout, but only Strava can tell you how good.