October is here and all my runners have disappeared! Never fear though, FOUR fantastic runners joined me to run 8km, meet our fellow GoodGym-er and Canal and River Trust bod Jack to help down at the Grand Union Canal at Harlesden!

With our group being smaller than usual we had a short intro and got going straight away. It’s a long old run to the canal and with fewer of us we wanted to get down there and get as much time to work as possible. We took our usual route cutting through Roundwood Park and we kept up a good pace everyone working hard in what was a surprisingly warm evening.

Once in Harlesden we met Jack in his usual spot by the canal and we talked about the various tasks on hand. We were a bit limited by the darkness but we were gonna do some focussed litter picking and go over our work to keep the steps down to the canal clean. Armed with various tools and headtorches we made our way to the canal and got to work:

• Liz and Samina focussed on the steps giving them a good sweep, weeding between the craps and generally clearing any rubbish
• Marcos and Tom got to work with the litter-pickers working their way up the canal and then focussing on the large planters by the steps from which we removed a large number of drinks cans despite our work previously!

Of the various odd finds (there are always some weird things) we found a three legged chair, lots of broken glass (so unsafe!), part of a car wheel clamp and as referenced in our title… a massive broom!

With our time drawing to a close we got everything bagged up and finished off where we could and then took our horde back to the van, disinfected our hands and posed for the obligatory group photo. With Jack’s thanks and goodbyes ringing in our ears we headed back to base again keeping up an impressive pace – well done everyone.

Back at the Queensbury we went through our post-run stretches and discussed the social this Thursday, the upcoming Brent social on the 17th October and our task next week helping Punch and Juicy get their shed built before we headed on home.

Great work everyone and see you next week!

Cheers, Pritesh