Needed a good cleaning along with the rest of the bus. Armed with buckets, sponges, cloths, sprays and a Henry Hoover, Sol and Adam got stuck into cleaning the inside whilst Zoe, Helen and Jen tackled the exterior. Doors, windows, side panels, wheels, rims, sills, floors, seats, fascias we left no surface untouched and were pleased that we could see our own reflections by the time we finished.

Sheila helped out at the Nature's Haven Community garden. Alongside another volunteer we dug out the leaf mould pile which has been maturing for the last 10 months. We were delighted to find that the worms and fungi had done their stuff, and turned fallen leaves into lovely leaf mould, which we then used to mulch the veg beds. Beautiful!

🦸‍♀️ Six litter-picking superheroes assembled at the community centre, ready to take on the challenge of tidying up the streets and parks of Maidenhead.

Armed with picks and hoops, we set off towards the station—a gentle stroll to warm up our eyes for the litter lurking ahead. From the station, we swooped into the High Street, scooping up mountains of cigarette butts and rogue takeaway cups.

Tony and Mike veered off down a side-street, while Sheila, Sarah, Jess, and Viv took the more direct route. Everyone found a few treasures, but the general consensus? The town centre was looking far tidier than on previous missions.

We were met with cheerful “Thank you!”s from passers-by, and even roped in a spontaneous participant for a race to a paper cup. He won—and his prize? The honour of binning it himself!

With the town centre sparkling, we ventured into Kidwells Park. Here, the litter was more plentiful, and our bags filled up fast. After an hour of heroic effort, we regrouped at the community centre to compare hauls and swap stories.

A job well done—and a wonderfully chatty, cheerful task to boot!

Moving plants around was the order of the day at Braywick Nursery. We started outside, moving all the perennials onto accessible benches as autumn begins to set in. When the rain started we moved into the glasshouse, and transferred all the pansies in flower so that they could be seen more easily, and making sure that a the six-packs all had a full complement of plants

6 GoodGymers helped out at the Kite Festival run by the wonderful Norden Farm. This is a lovely, free event, and the people of Maidenhead turned up in their droves. Viv helped with the set-up of the event, putting up gazebos and signage to help with the smooth-running of the day. Lisa was stationed at the entrance, encouraging people to make donations to help with costs and fund future events. Rachel and Sheila armed themselves with litter-pickers, although generally not much litter was dropped. It was perfect weather for kite-flying and it was lovely to see so many kites airborne and whoops of delight from the children. It was such a happy atmosphere. Georgeta and Jen joined us for the take-down but not before we had enjoyed some of the music and joined in with the bird rave (you had to be there!) . Jen took down all the signs from around site whilst we did a final litterpick, and then were sent out to remove the big advertising banners from the roadside with some rather inadequate scissors! A fun event that was great to be part of, and Jen can recommend the gelato!

Kanika and Diya turned up at Mr. & Mrs. B's home to help fix the "four wobbly slabs" in their garden as they are a tripping hazard for the elderly couple.

It became clear very quickly this was no easy fix. Not only did the slabs weigh a ton - which slowed down their movement and placement considerably - the problem of the uneven path was compounded due to a thick root which had snaked its way underneath the slabs. To be fair, tools were provided but they hadn't been sharpened in years so we used a combination of shovel, pick-axe, saw and....a kitchen knife to hack at the root. (GoodGymers don't give up, do we?!)

1 hour and 45 mins later, the two GoodGymers were exhausted and the original plan to "go to the gym right after the task", evaporated rapidly! The couple were very thankful and tried their best to give us money. In the end, we accepted some plums from their garden tree as a thank you. 

A good deed + solid workout, done ✅