A whopping turnout of 17 GoodGymmers made a huge difference to the grounds that wrap around St Peter's Church.

One main aim of the session was clearing all sorts of unwanted stuff out of the gardens and filling up the bins outside, including a heap of old furniture and scrap metal, stray traffic cones, old plant pots and fallen leaves. Another task was scooping mulch out of a very large container and tipping it onto the flower beds and there was even time and enough helping hands for some litter picking.

A warm welcome to the three new faces, Ming, Lake and You who all made their GG debuts on this sunny evening. Afterwards a few people headed to the Royal Oak pub in Columbia Road for a well deserved drink. 🍺

7 goodgymers from different areas picked and dropped a few items for the foodbank. Helping each other, whether they are people known to us or not keeps the world going in the right direction.

On a balmy East London evening, task owner Alex welcomed us by Barge East for what must surely be one of the most seasonally appropriate GoodGym tasks ever. With temperatures hovering around 30 degrees, it almost felt like we were at the seaside rather than in the middle of Stratford/Hackney Wick!

Our mission at Bola Beach Tennis was to help maintain the three beach tennis courts. Over time, the sand gradually migrates to one side thanks to a combination of enthusiastic players and the wind doing its thing, so we spent the evening shovelling, moving and raking sand back into a level playing surface. We also swept around the edges of the courts and returned escaped sand to its rightful home.

Some of the group embraced the beach atmosphere fully and went barefoot, enjoying the rare experience of getting sand between their toes during a Monday evening GoodGym task in central London!

The evening's most memorable challenge, however, came in the form of a gigantic roll of astro turf that needed moving. Despite the combined efforts of almost the entire group (the only exceptions were Jo and Dan, who wisely remained focused on expertly levelling Court 1 ), it refused to budge. We wrestled with the stubborn, immovable object and eventually admitted temporary defeat.

We then spent a lovely half hour after the task relaxing with cold cans of pop from Alex (including sampling the Brazilian favourite Guaraná) and brainstorming increasingly creative solutions to the astro turf problem. Suggestions included: - A "toss-the-caber" style approach (from Lucinda) - Sawing it into smaller chunks (Reymon's practical engineering solution) - Dragging it flat like a giant parachute game (thanks Chloe!) - And finally the consensus view: it probably needs a crane or to be airlifted ?

Watch this space... the saga of the astro turf is (possibly) to be continued...

A huge thank you to everyone who came along and brought beach energy to East London for an evening. Hope you enjoyed your slice of Hackney Wick seaside life — see you all next week! 🌞🏖️💪

A large group of goodgymers old and new joined Ken on a pleasant Monday evening for the usual spot of gardening in the cemetery park. Following the heatwave there was lots to be done. This week’s task was tackling another ‘verdant villain’ called Hogweed. This piggy plant hogs all the nutrients and sunlight and spreads rapidly to the detriment of the surrounding nature. Ken explained the importance of other nearby plants which attract rare species of bee to the cemetery park and are vital to the ecosystem and threatened by the invasive hogweed.

We set to work with our gloves, loppers and secateurs clearing the weed from a triangular patch near the pond. The wheelbarrows filled up as we cut stem after stem, then it was off to empty them on the pile. It was great to see the progress of the patch we cleared in a power hour of Goodgym effort. A huge welcome to our three new Goodgymers; Ana, Joely and Nuunuu. Thanks for all your help and we’d love you to join us again soon!

The award-winning community garden at the Canal Club brings residents together, supports biodiversity and provides a shared green space opening onto the Regent’s Canal. A notification by our former Area Activator and chief motivator Laura, that she’d be hosting a weekly palates session there reminded us that we hadn’t visited the centre for some time - and we hadn’t caught up with Laura for a while either

On arrival, she bounded out to greet us, as fresh and full of energy as ever. But we had work to do – those pesky weeds had pushed their way up between the paving stones, making the front of the centre look rather untidy

Several of our number arrived fresh from the shindig weekend, enthused by meeting GoodGymers from around the country, then finding they couldn’t wait more than 24 hours for more GoodGym, Before we got going, Darren wanted to know which ice cream everyone prefers, which can only mean he’s planning to treat us all with our favourite selection at next week’s task. We also congratulated Tom on his 50th Good Deed!

Meanwhile, using a variety of tools, we each found our own way to liberate the weeds from their trap between the stones, laying them cosily in a wheelbarrow and transporting them to a nice new home, reunited with their friends in a compost pile next to the canal

An hour later, there wasn’t a weed to be seen. And the nice plant we’d been told to leave alone, was left untouched, safe behind its nicely-drawn chalk line. After catching up with Laura, who made GoodGym Tower Hamlets what it is today, we sampled task-owner Sally’s lemon drizzle, and were expertly served tea and coffee by our Louise, before some of us headed for the pub to complete our evening

The Canal Club, however, is currently proposed as a site for development. It was built for residents of the Wellington Estate and its activities include toddler storytelling, baby dance classes, Tai Chi, knitting and sewing, outdoor pizza making, breakdancing, line dancing, karaoke social evenings, a science homework club, singing, refugee activities, a food bank, arts and crafts, and Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings. There is a ball park and a children’s playground

This is not an empty site! Call on the council to remove the site from its accelerated housing scheme by signing the petition at https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/save-our-space-e2-save-the-canal-club