GoodGym Ealing may not visit St Andrew's Church in North Ealing frequently, but everyone looks forward to another session there - maybe because the tasks are so unique? The task owner, John, always has a new interesting project for us. This time, he offered us a mixture of new (a DIY task) and familiar (hedge trimming). John knew well that our team could be very effective when it comes to cutting shrubs (maybe even too effective!), so he entrusted us with shaping the hedge at the side of the church. A job that required even more trust in GoodGym was renovating a memorial bench of Roy James Matthews - an artist who used to run art classes for the local community at St Andrew's centre. John consulted the late artist's family before proceeding with the task, so we were committed to doing all the sanding in painting to a high standard.

Steph Ducat and Christos employed a variety of scissor-like tools, including long-handled edging shears, to suppress the unruly expansion of the hedge. The boisterous plant responded by releasing sap, covering Steph's t-shirt, face and shades with sticky spots.

Are you sure you have not chosen the painting task, Steph?

Despite St Andrew's being a United Reformed Church, Christos got to practice Zen meditation by raking the gravel. Getting the leaves out from between the stones required a great deal of patience!

On the other side of the church and the community centre, Claire, Freya and Sevan engaged in an artistic activity: bench renovation - from sanding, through blowing the dust away, to applying varnish. The challenging aspect was painting the hard-to-access surfaces with big paint brushes. One of Roy James' students, who was visiting the community space, came to the rescue! He went back home and brought us what you can easily find in an artist's house: a smaller paintbrush. That made our job a breeze.

Madhan and Kash got to rotate between the two tasks and apply their versatile skills in the arts of both creation and decimation. John was delighted with the results of GoodGym's intervention and, as usual, grateful for our support.

Since the days got longer, the Ealing team was increasingly keen on the fitness element of GoodGym. On the way to the session, our running crew opted for a 2.5 km of hill running. Returning to Ealing Broadway, we took the shortest route down but finished with an 8-minute full-body interval workout.

Next Tuesday, we are visiting a different part of the borough to help Hanwell School of Boxing with the maintenance of their outdoor space. Sign up and join us!

Last December GoodGymers helped Earthwatch Europe plant a new Tiny Forest in Hanger Hill Park. You can see how small the snips had been back then in this story! What is Tiny Forest, you may ask. It is a native woodland of 600 trees planted densely in a tennis-court-sized plot. Tiny Forests mimic the features of a traditional forest while taking up minimal space. Earthwatch is conducting research across the country to help understand how these little woods have the potential to be a powerful tool in the fight against climate change and habitat loss.

To help our partners from Earthwatch, five Ealing GoodGymers: Claire, Freya, Steph Ducat, Sevan and Kash turned scientists for one evening to collect data on how the trees were growing and how much carbon they could capture. The endeavour involved plenty of tape measures and an uphill run!

It was the first Ealing session for Freya, who returned to London (and GoodGym) after a long break and established herself in our area. Great choice, Freya - and welcome to Ealing!

After the optional 2.5km run to conquer Hanger Hill, the task was pretty easy-going. It didn't require getting particularly physical - unless you count squatting to measure the diameter of a tree. That gave Kash an idea about tonight's fitness session - the Sally Up squat challenge! Check it out here if you haven't heard about it.

Another challenge was identifying some of the trees that didn't look like we were expecting them to look. Their tag said holly, but the Google Lens said eucalyptus.

Is there a koala on it?
No.
Then it's not an eucalyptus.

The samples didn't look anything like the above. The Earthwatch survey prompt suggested another option: goat willow. We looked the name up on the internet and found pictures of similarly looking trees to our sample, also called pussy willow or salix caprea. That seemed more sensible than Aussie trees in the UK.

After surveying most of the tagged trees and completing the Sally Up challenge, we treated ourselves to a gentle 1.5 km run down the hill, wondering how satisfied our legs would feel tomorrow.

Join us next week for a task in Hanwell, with a totally optional run, to help organisers of the famous free festival, Hanwell Hootie. Sign up now!