Three GoodGymers helped out at Stepney Bank Stables on a very pleasant Monday evening. The tasks tonight involved unloading hay bales from the horse box and then sweeping it out, before trying to remove the weeds from between the cobbles in the yard. A random oasser-by even offered to assist at one point!

It was lovely to see Jason back in the toon, on a sabbatical away from Leeds - fingers crossed your St James' Park experience is a good one.

Alongside Damu and Chris and Charlotte from Newcastle Parks, we had a mission with some weedy cobbles.

We filled trug after trug (another word for those plastic buckets) but as ever with these kind of tasks, there is still plenty to tackle next time!

Tonight's task was a mega leaflet delivery for Big Local Gateshead, letting residents in the Teams area know about group cycling sessions led by experienced cycling guide Mark. Mark had already delivered a lot of leaflets so we walked away from the Tyne View Health Hub where the rides begin and covered millions* more homes in the Staithes area. It turned out to be a beautiful evening for a riverside walk!

The big news of the evening was the return of Anji for her first session as a regular member rather than as Area Activator, and her first since her recent accident. It was fantastic to have you back Anji!

We walked over 5k tonight - the perfect shake out for Michael who is running the Manchester marathon on Sunday. Good luck Michael!

It was also fascinating to learn that as well as teaching and guiding cycling, Mark does all kinds of dancing, including Angolan Kizomba, which was new to all of us!

Every day is a school day with GoodGym!

*Quite a lot!

This morning was our third visit to Greenhill allotments to help prep Magrets plot.

We continued to work our way down the plot pulling up weed and clearing grass.

The weeds had taken over this section, with deep and chunky roots. Digging them up was very satisfying!

There’s still plenty to do here and I’m sure we will be back again.

Three GoodGymers litter picked in the Ouseburn valley on a spring evening. The plan had been to go litter pick down towards the quayside but when we picked up the litter pickers from Stepney Bank Stables Sara informed us that there had been a market in the Ouseburn at the weekend which had been great for the area but resulted in a lot of litter. So we set off up the valley found plenty of cans, drink cups and a lot of newspapers some of which had been frustratingly ripped into little pieces! It was very satisfying clearing up the area post market and we really felt like we made a difference.

It was a gorgeous day for our second visit to Magret’s plot and our link up with Newcastle Parks and Allotments. We made a start on clearing the plot a couple of weeks ago. Sadly there were already some weeds flourishing in the area we had cleared so we spent some time clearing that area, before moving on to the next section.

It seems like our memo about axes from a different task this week has filtered through and Aimee in particular was delighted to see the presence of an axe today! Max put it to good use, breaking up the ground, which seemed harder this time than last time, probably due to the warm sunshine we’ve had lately! Tanya, on the other hand, was less successful with the tools, choosing a spade with the diggy bit (that’s a technical term!) coming off the handle as soon as she tried digging!

There was a spell during the task when we felt like we weren’t getting anywhere, but then it all came together. You can definitely see that we made progress today! And it was lovely to be joined by some local wildlife, although we’re not sure how healthy the bee was! The cat, however, seemed very content basking in the sunshine!

There’s still a way to go though. Fortunately, we’re back again next Saturday. There’s rain forecast for this week so the ground should be a bit softer. We’d love to see you there!