Five GoodGymers visited The Lighthouse Project in Byker for the third time recently, to continue our mission to rid their gardens of weeds.

We welcomed Norb to GoodGym Newcastle for the first time. He really enjoyed the run to The Lighthouse Project up the hills and steps!

We removed a large amount of weeds across quite a large area, the biggest issue being finding bags big enough to put them in. For the first time in quite some time on a Monday night, we got absolutely soaked as the rain came pouring down towards the end. We got particularly wet on the run back to Stepney Bank Stables!

Another successful evening though and we'll be back at The Lighthouse Project next week. Please join us if you can!

We greeted two newcomers to GoodGym Newcastle tonight. Welcome to Elena, not new to GoodGym but joining us in Newcastle for the first time. We're very glad that you made it just in time! Another warm welcome to Joanna, completing her first GoodGym good deed tonight. Hopefully the first of many! We hope to see you in your red GoodGym t-shirt soon!

Tonight's task was to visit The Lighthouse Project to clear some weeds from their garden. The level of effort from everyone tonight was very impressive and at least eight large bags were filled with weeds. Task owner Jo and the other staff seemed pleased with our efforts!

We'll be back at The Lighthouse Project in two weeks. Next Monday sees us volunteering at Jesmond Library for the first time in seven years. Please join us if you can!

On a warm, but occasionally mildly moist, Monday evening, five GoodGymers headed to Shieldfield and Sandyford armed with hundreds of Ouseburn Festival leaflets. This continued the task we started last week in Heaton. Shieldfield and Sandyford don't have quite as many terraced streets for easy leaflet delivery, but we delivered almost as many leaflets as last week, on what was another successful evening.

The award for most littered area stumbled across tonight belongs to Croft Stairs, near City Road and Manor Chare. GoodGym Newcastle's three intrepid litter pickers stumbled across some sort of den and filled many bin bags with rubbish in double quick time!

Everything was heading for a successful conclusion, but while depositing the last of the litter into a bin, Jack cut his hand while some strange liquids leaked onto Richard. We hope the cut heals quickly Jack!

The first GoodGym Monday group run to finish in daylight for what feels like a very long time was a bit of a mixed bag, in more ways than one.

As part of the Great British Spring Clean 2026 (we are a day late but never mind), we decided to head to Heaton Park, one of the parks not targeted by the council's organised litter picks the last couple of weeks. The night began with us having obscenities shouted at us by some unkempt imbeciles and ended with a young girl's dad approaching us saying she wanted to thank us for our efforts. Quite a contrast in our interactions with passers-by tonight.

In between, Heaton Park was surprisingly tidy, with very little litter. The journey there and the journey away from the park yielded many bags of litter, at least two or three each for our group of four GoodGymers.

It was great to welcome Bryn for her first good deed tonight, we hope we didn't overload you with too much GoodGym-related information. We are very enthusiastic about what we do! Experienced hands Scott and Jack made light work of the litter that crossed our paths, while Richard was left wondering whether the pompom on his hat really deserved to be the subject of such obscene abuse (probably not).