A strong shed is built on solid foundations

With Andres needing the time and space to clean up and close Old Spike, the team met on the green. Luckily, it was a dry and warm Wednesday evening as Katy, John, Nathan, Isaac, Lindy, Claire, Daryl and Emma were all up for the 3.5k run to Galleywall Nature Reserve. After Sam delivered his intro speech and a few people dropped off their bags and bikes in Old Spike, Sam led the warm-up before asking his ice-breaker question for the week: Since it's Bastille in two days' time, what's your favourite thing about France?

We had all sorts of answers from your classics: croissant, cider, pastries, cheeses, snails, frog legs and wines to relatives and colleagues being from the French nation.

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Saturday night, I feel the air is getting hot...like you baby

Leading from the front, Sam ensured the group barged through Rye Lane before joining and watching out for cyclists on the Grand Surrey Canal Walk! After running across Old Kent Road, we just had a kilometre to go as this is one of our longer group runs, but we arrived at Galleywall Nature Reserve on time. Thanks to Daryl for backmarking.

At the site, Paulin, Vic, Magda and Folarin were already on site as they were taking directions from Alan, Eddie and Jane. Yet, we re-grouped as we arrived to properly give out the tasks.

Firstly, Daryl and Magda were given bin liners and litter pickers to give up litter from the site. Jane needed three people to empty out the old shed and put these items into the new one. Katy, Emma and Claire were up for this whilst Lindy and Paulin were advised by Alan to remove nails off two wooden boards using a drill. Finally, the remaining group of John, Isaac, Folarin, Nathan and Vic teamed up with Eddie as he had a massive task of digging out the foundations, moving soil and preparing the foundations of a new shed. Emma did arrive slightly later, but Jane still had new tasks for us. She asked Emma to search the site to pick up and collect any loose nails. Unfortunately, during this re-design project lots of fasteners (nails, screws and bolts) have been left behind after the scaffolding to the building next door had been taken down.

After 40 minutes, listening to tunes and working on each of our own task, we had to call it a night. Yet, Eddie wanted to make sure we finished off the foundation task, so each person took a slab to put down on the (un)even soil and sand base. With a quick group photo on the foundation, we said our goodbyes and the same group apart from John ran back to Old Spike. Some called it a night whilst others were up for one drink at The Angel Oak.

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Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out tonight! Thank you for keeping up with the long run either way! Alan, Eddie and Jane appreciated that we had a large group to do various tasks around the Nature Reserve. We were able to complete a few tasks and left with the foundations of the shed set and in place. Next time, we might build the new shed!

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Thank You to myself

GoodGym is all about getting fit and doing good! We praise the runners/cyclists/walkers who come to get fit and help out, but we often forget about our task owner. I would like to take this opportunity to thank Alan, Eddie and Jane for preparing the tasks for us to do and getting us in order. We will be back on the 2nd of August!