On a warm summer evening, the lovely GoodGym Greenwich crew took a short dash to Charlton Manor Primary School to lend a hand in their nursery garden. The mission? A mix of bench painting and weed-busting to get the space looking spick-and-span for the little ones.

Paintbrushes in hand, we gave the playground benches a fresh coat of colour while the rest of the team tackled overgrown patches of the nursery garden with gusto. It didn’t take long before the place looked greener, neater, and definitely more welcoming.

During our weeding adventures, we made a surprising discovery: 15 tennis balls scattered around the garden....Perhaps a mini-Wimbledon had taken place without us? (Very on-theme, with the real Wimbledon just around the corner next week!)

To top it all off, a group of curious fox cubs peeked out to watch us work, clearly approving of the transformation.

A good workout, a tidier garden and some brighter benches for the kids to enjoy. Game, set, and match to us!

This weekend we've got our river walk and weeding at Mycenae gardens. Next week to kick off July we've got a new task in the woodland garden of the memorial hopsital. Be prepared for a run up shooters hill for that one 😁

Until next time!

Rachel

5 Good Gymers joined Team Clean Up Charlton to tackle a bad patch on the Woolwich Road near Selco, and a usual favourite grot-spot down Anchor & Hope Lane. With 9 of us it was almost a scrum to chase that litter down! The youngest member of the team showed amazing talent for searching out clean recyclables - we got two bags of bottles and cans between us and 11 bags in total in just an hour.

As usual Ashton was the first behind the bushes and down in the ditches - we know he puts Sarah and Ivar on a pedestal but maybe this was taking it too literally. We might love a fair but there's no excuse for dumping the signs behind the shrubs - there's no hiding your trash from us, Blackheath Fun Fair!

As usual the approved bags are left for our friends at Greenwich Council to collect. Thanks to everyone who came along!

Today we were back at Maryon Park community garden, a wonderful space that has been lovingly run by Edna and Tim for many years. Coming here has always been a favourite task for Good Gym Greenwich and it was nice to be back. The tasks today were manyfold; the garden having become quite overgrown in places and a gap had opened up in the orchard that needed to be plugged to make things safer.

So to work, and two of the team worked to plug the gap using some old pieces of fence (with some masterful manoeuvring needed to get said fences to the orchard), two of us set to trimming overhanging foliage and the rest of us set to removing copious numbers of weeds.

And karma was kind to us: despite a terrible weather forecast the rain held off for the whole session and after an hour’s hard work we were done. As usual Tim and Edna had generously provided snacks and we also benefited for some lovely leftover cake that Cat had prepared for her book group (thanks Cat, it was lovely).

Tonight's task for GoodGym Greenwich brought us back to St Richard's Church in Charlton, where we're working on a ongoing project to make the outside area, formerly a weeded wilderness, a more user-friendly, comfortable area for the community.

For anyone following this project, we've battled rebellious plant life, embraced our inner cave people by fashioning our own tools for staple administration, and turned mountains (of woodchip) into molehills.

So on a lovely rainy breezy sunny evening in June, 7 goodgym-ers got to work continuing with this process. First the cardboard had to come up, which has helped restrict weed growth, then it was back to our routine we've got going now of digging, membraning and spreading the pine-scented woodchip, and with lots of chatter, the task time flew by. Time for a quick group photo and update on plans for the area, before our ways parted until next time! Thanks all & have a good week 😊