Ashley, Pete, Mandy and Rachel met at the usual Tuesday night start point for a litter picking session with a difference. As well as the usual waterproof jackets, litter pickers and bin bags, the group were all carrying backpacks which were filled to the brim with donations for The Hope Centre foodbank. Especially Ashley's who had some bumper packs of tins with him.

As part of a national initiative by GoodGym, this session had been put in the calendar to bump up supplies following a busy Easter at the foodbank.

The group headed off to litter pick along the route to the foodbank, where Pete regularly helps out at as a volunteer. Along the way the group saw building work coming along for the city's new performance venue and an exciting outdoor social space for events and live music, 'Electric Daisy'. Donations were gratefully received and the group headed on to continue litter picking in a loop of a route around the city centre. Slightly less competition between our litter picking King and Queen, Ashley and Mandy, than usual as Ashley's focus was on his weighty bag of donations and not beating Mandy to the most litter to be picked/most unusual item found.

The group had a local resident comment on how bad the litter down their street can be, particularly after Friday and Saturday night and so will look at adding in this route to litter picking sessions in the future.

If you are able to make a donation to the foodbank, check out the items they need the most and see details of where and when to drop them off here.

Thanks to everyone for helping out this evening, Mandy had already been volunteering during the day so extra GoodGym points for her.

Ashley met Mandy, David and Pete a little way into the task and was able to supervise for 10 minutes while the task was done. Good job everyone. A small task this night but another opportunity for the local school children to sow wild flowers and make the boarders look fantastic. Sometimes it's not about the task, it's that we can get together and chat, social interaction is so important for mental health.