You Better Dock, Dock, Dock on Wood(chip)!

As the September evenings draw in, Lewisham sees sixteen of its finest runners taking on 10.5km, shifting an impressive mountain of wood-chip, weeding the edges of some handsome raised beds and saying a fair few 'aaaahhhhhs' down on the farm.

It's amazing, at this time of year, what a difference an hour makes. Just take a look at the photos and see how dark it went and how very quickly! Feeling the evenings getting darker, we planned a little 'end-of-summer treat' this week, with a visit to the Surrey Docks Farm - the treat being a chance to see cute animals, a good, hard task and a long run along the river, not something we get to do very often on our Monday runs.

Quick! Warm up!

I had asked everyone to arrive promptly this evening, wanting to get out running as early as possible, to maximise our time at the task. We were soon creating a sea of red in the foyer of Glass Mill, with a few first-timers joining us to see what it's all about. Welcome James, Steph and Steve (just to confuse me, these two stood next to Stephen in the circle and my head was well and truly blown). Our warm-up was short and sweet tonight, with a long run ahead of us, we did some brisk high knees, skips, side steps and heel-flicks. Our hearts were beating faster, our breath was shorter and we were glowing, all good signs that it's time to run!

This way!

We ran at quite a pace towards the Brookmill (the venue for last week's social, yum), but thought better of stopping by for refreshments, another time. The chatter was loud but so were the sirens, with flashing blue lights holding back the traffic along the usually fast-flowing New Cross Road. We skirted quickly around blue and white tape, as police directed traffic around what appeared to be a car accident. It was definitely a case of two feet good here, as we wound our way up to Deptford Church Street, taking in all the lovely new cafes and venues that have popped up in the past couple of years, all nestling amongst the hustle, bustle and vibrancy of market life. A few more skips and we found ourselves already on Evelyn Street and nearing the Thames Path.

A few of us had never really ventured along here on foot, so it was a bit of an adventure all round - a GoodGym group run is definitely a great pace to learn new running routes! We talked about the rich heritage of this interesting little area (currently a bit of a building site, with lots of new homes being built behind mysterious-looking hoardings). Diarist John Evelyn lived nearby, in Sayes Court (which we ran past), with a small, but perfectly formed community garden still remaining amongst the flats along here, the last traces of his legacy (we did a starter session here back in February...). It's amazing how quickly a run passes when you are chatting and we soon found ourselves near the water and brushing up to bobbing boats at the quay. At this point, the Thames Path can get a bit higgledy-piggledy, but we trotted across a little lock - pausing to take a photo - and caught site of Canary Wharf across the water, looking quite pretty. With the scent of Eau de Countryside wafting our way, we knew we were nearing the farm!

Let me in, let me in!

...said the Billy Goats Gruff...We were greeted by Gemma, who unlocked the gate and showed us straight in and straight over to see the piglets, clearly the star attraction! I was here back at the beginning of August and, boy, have they grown! Little curly tails wagged, especially when they thought it might be feeding time! Sadly it wasn't and there was an important task to do. We were shown a pile of fresh wood-chip and a line of wheelbarrows. Gemma proudly showed us over to the newly constructed raised beds, all twelve (I think) of them! Alongside these were also two new outbuildings and some paths that needed levelling out a bit.

As the light faded quickly, our volunteers set to work. Some got down and started weeding and clearing the areas around the raised beds, others grabbed wheelbarrows and started scooping, grabbing, spooning and picking the wood-chip into them, anything really that got the barrows filled quickly, they were on a mission! Wood-chip seems to be magic stuff, covering lumps and bumps, creating a good surface and making the whole area look 'finished'. As this train went back and forth, a bat was seen flying in circles around us, zoning in on the bugs that were being disturbed by our work, benefiting from our presence.

Weee, weee, weeeeee all the way home!

Five minutes to go and two more rounds of wheelbarrow loads were brought over, there's just no stopping them! It seemed wrong to leave any of the wood-chip on the ground, so the pile was successfully transported to where it was needed, before a procession formed along the path to the store (complete with cute, floppy-eared goat lurking in the (now) dark). Tools were put away, hands were washed, water was gulped and thank yous were said. Gemma took us up and around so we could leave by the river, through the lovely leafy gates, casting a beautiful autumnal shadow on our path. This seemed a good point to take another group photo, but we had all but disappeared in the grainy light by now.

We made sure our run back took a less direct route, enjoying the Thames and its delicious night-time sparkle, enjoying being able to run in complete darkness in places, knowing there's safety in numbers, enjoying the meander of the route, taking us through new areas and popping us up where we least expected. We said goodbye at points to some runners who headed home, regrouped at others to make sure nobody was left behind and everyone felt safe. We reached Lewisham and our start (end) point and enjoyed a good stretch whilst congratulating each other on a task well done and a 10.5km well run. Additional kudos to Gemma, who had at first thought she might take the return leg transport option, but instead went for the full run, not having run that distance for some time, excellent stuff!

Well done everyone and see you next week, when we will have a last visit to the Wildcat Wilderness for this year.