That's what bystanders must have been thinking as they saw us running back to Mud Dock from the task in torrential rain!

The run started out sunny enough with a tough 2.5km uphill climb to Henleaze Primary School to help them take out a pond that was no longer safe for children. Alexandra kindly "front-marked" while I brought up the rear. Once at the school, we were given a wide variety of rakes, spades, loppers and one very mechanically-sophisticated lopper (which swiftly became David's "favourite tool"). We worked quickly to help the parents of the school and other volunteers clear the area of shrubbery and dig out the pond lining, with excellent shovelling technique being demonstrated by Richard and Julie.

As the skies darkened, we wrapped up our work and headed back to Mud Dock. The the few drops quickly escalated and when we thought it couldn't rain any harder, it rained even harder! As Gloucester Road turned into a river, all hope of keeping our trainers remotely dry were abandoned. Of course, by the time we got back to Mud Dock, the sun was shining again!

Its a long old way to StreetGoat. Especially when they close all the crossings and you have to navigate a way all round Temple Meads roundabout. Luckily we had some super strong running today going on today and so we were only a couple of minutes late by the time we got to the allotments.

I'm not going to dwell on my reunion with my favourite Nanny goat Lily but it was certainly a special moment and she was clearly very happy to see me again. Good to see lots of others also taking an opportunity to get in a quick photo and petting opportunity with some of the goats as our time with them was a little fleeting today.

However, to balance the absence of goat we had FIRE. And BOW SAWS. And LOPPERS. And PRUNING SAWS. And a potential health and safety minefield. (The like of which hasn't been see since we bashed up a shed from the roof downwards last year)

So as I got my accident book out ready, everyone spread out around an enormous pile of sticks and branches to cut them to size and dispose of them on the nearby bonfire. As people worked through they looked out for any larger sturdier branches that could be made to us a fence and put them to one side.

With only about half an hour available to us, we still managed to make a huge dent in the pile and I'm please to report that there were no accidents so kudos to everyone for sawing and burning in such a professional manner.

The run back was a little easier as its mostly downhill so we got back in good time to wish Darren 'Happy Birthday' and head back to Mud Dock to share enojoy the cakes that he and Izzy brought along today.

Given that it turned to Winter literally overnight, it was fantastic to have so many people come along and help out the Frome Fairies with a bit of maintenance work down at Eastville park yesterday. New runner Izzy is obviously made of sterner stuff choosing this freezing morning to embark on her very first GG Bristol outing - coming very well prepared with plenty of warm layers :)

Since the task was to take place on the actual parkrun route next to the lake, it seemed only right to offer any parkrun'ers the chance to join directly from the event so by the time my group arrived from the mud dock there was already plenty of activity - though it was noticable that the sunny side of the lake seemed to have rather more occupants than the rather chilly shady side. Special mention though to Richard who still chose the more remote Pomphrey option (with a Halloween theme!) before running over to Eastville for the task.

Our host Andrew dished out hoes and spades and everyone got to work digging out weeds around the edge of the lakeside trail. This was just about physical enough to keep people warm and with folks by now spaced out all along the perimeter we managed to cover a lot of ground.

A small cut to Sarah's leg sustained on a bramble meant the GG Bristol first aid kit got its first ever outing and - with a slight breeze - then found its way promptly into the lake. Luckily Emma was on hand and demonstrated amazing reflexes in retrieving it before it floated off to the Island.

Finally, after a group photo we all headed back to Mud Dock for a well earned warm cup of coffee,

Nice to see Liam feeeling a bit better and joining us today and great to have Deb and Paul back with us - we've really missed you guys! And 'au revoir' to Caroline as she returns to GG Sheffield to join in their 2nd birthday celebrations - hopefully see you back in Bristol very soon!