What a glorious evening!

10 runners met in the dusk sunshine at the top of the very busy Peckham Rye to run a short run to get our hands dirty at Cossall Park.

After a warm up with a variety of different jumps whilst giving a mini intro, we set off in a totally different direction to Cossall Park to help the lovely Jaki and Allen. They manage the community grow beds which are built into the local park, engaging school children, scouts and local residents in outdoor activity and growing veg and plants. They also look after nearby Kirkwood Nature Reserve which they reclaimed which was an overgrown den used as a sharps dumping ground and a dog toilet.

It was lovely to see what they've been up to and we got set to work weeding in 3 areas with some wonderful gardening tools. With the radio playing, local kids playing near and a beautiful sunset to boot, we made light work of the weeding despite finding lots of hidden mini potatoes and lots of impressively long worms.

Jaki was pretty pleased with how much we had gotten through and had the orange squash ready for us once we'd finished. Deepak had to be torn away from turning earth so we may have to revisit or continue the gardening run (ha) this spring. Matt also had his nettle cuttings ready to brave making nettle risotto - we have a very practical group here in Southwark!

We said our goodbyes to the lovely couple but not yet to the park... when we arrived, it was clear that the play area could been used for a bit of fun so Jo set up a mini obstacle ... plank, sideways bear crawls, squats on the most unstable platform and a run through the rope gauntlet. The squats were pretty tricky but everyone survived (don't panic headoffice!) and finished by hanging off another implement and realising how difficult chin ups were.

Warmed up and a bit sweaty from the obstacle, we ran the short distance home at a quick pace, fuelled by squash and sunshine. If that's not a perfect Wednesday evening...

On Sunday GoodGymers took part in the best game of hide and seek ever created. The prize: a party.

Keep the faith.... Seek and ye shall find

Taking the role of foot taxis across the capital they encouraged seekers on their quest towards tea, cake and a man with a load of balloons up his clothes.

We ran 10k to Ha Ha Road in Charlton last night. In the wind and rain to tidy a dirty stretch of road side

The power of Twitter

We didn't have a job this week so in an effort to find something beneficial to do for our Greenwich brethren I put a tweet out asking if anyone knew of any areas that could use a 'GoodGym flash mob clear up'.

We got a response from TheOnlyWayisWoolwich who told us "the Ha Ha on Ha Ha Road is always in need of a litter pick". So we did it...running 5k out and 5k back to give it a bash.

chicken and crisps....a fabulous ditch

The Ha Ha is a former river running alongside the road and though it could do with a clear out, it was leaves rather than rubbish that need shifting. As the rain came down we decided our time on this visit was best used in tidying an equally messy area of the road just up the street. This spot (opposite the hospital) was an eyesore- full of cans, crisp packets and chicken shop paraphernalia. So we quickly bagged it up and found a bin to chuck it in.

We'll head back and attack the Ha Ha in future- when we have more bags, bins and leaf raking equipment!

5k home

We set off home on leg 2 of our 10k run- back to Greenwich Uni. Back was much easier than out, mainly because we ran down rather than up Greenwich hill. We got home by 8.30pm for a quick stretch out of the way of the Warner Bros film crews who had ensconsed themselves on campus. Hopefully a GoodGymer will have secretly strayed in shot!

On a rather wet Wednesday evening 15 GoodGymers headed to two tasks across Camden

The first group of 8 headed to the American International Church to help make beds for the homeless. Run report written by Pritesh:

We were back at the homeless shelter at the American International Church this week and eight brave Camden-ers were on hand to get the beds prepped for their guests this night. A bit of rain never harmed anyone and after a quick briefing from Paul ("don't fall off the stage!") we headed off into the wet night with myself and Becky looking after the group.

Don't fall off the stage

We'd clearly proved our hand at bed making last week and with Stephanie our usual contact away we were just told the number of beds needed and left to get on with it! With fewer of us than we had last week we all had to be efficient and apart from a few issues (is this a double duvet that I'm trying to put a single cover on?!) we managed to get all 18 beds laid out and covered in time. The staff were very grateful and we departed just as the guests arrived.

Castlehaven Run Report:

The other seven wonderful GoodGymers headed to Castlehaven, which is a small but high profile, vibrant community association that continues to develop and respond to the needs of local residents.

After a gentle run there we met Fred and he explained our tasks. We split into two groups, one forking, shovelling and generally rearranging a compost area. The second group raked leaves up around the gardens, this is to prevent any needles or other unpleasant things ending up in the leaves which could be picked up by children.

Forking Compost

Great news from Fred from Castlehaven who told us that the bulbs we planted in autumn are now flowering - really amazing to see the value of our work!

Pritesh and Becky's group arrived at Castlehaven just in time to help pack up before a slog down the canal through the rain and back to base. After a quick stretch in the rain a few people decided they weren't quite wet enough and headed for a deserved beverage at 'the local'!

Starter session on Saturday 5th Match to Kentish Town City Farm. Bring your friends!

Also as Camden GoodGym we are going to do Regents Park 10k together at the start of April.

Thanks for coming, hope you all got dry!

Tonight's long run was nailed by our intrepid runners. 8kms out and back almost to Elephant & Castle felt like a lovely achievement in all in the mid-week blur.

This time, we met Rob, the volunteer co-ordinator for Cool Tan Arts which is a charity for arts and mental health. He told us a little bit about the work they do, showed us some amazing art and then led us to their store cupboard. We vomited audio visual equipment all over their hall, emptied out archive boxes and used a lift reminiscent of a horror movie to dispose of floppy discs and broken musical instruments. It always seems like we'll not finish the task and then somehow we pull it off. With a minute to spare and time to eat some of the fruit which Rob had cut up for us. The discussion then turned to the best colour jelly baby and nearly got ugly (It's green, clearly) and then we got our legs and minds prepped to people dodge our way back to Peckham. A few of the more competitive attendees had sprint races on the quiet streets and our first-timer, Andy, clearly has some extra energy and pace to burn. We've put him up for the Man Vs Horse Race and he likes a challenge.

As ever, we finished our run with a stretch and discussion over which pub is the best pub to have our first GG Southwark social. Front runners are The Rye or the Victoria Inn. Suggestions please for Wednesday 16th March after the run!

See you next week for some outdoor fun at Lettsom Gardens. We'll be shovelling & digging some holes after a much shorter run. Hill sprints at the end, optional!