This session was a lovely excuse to engage in some nice peaceful gardening.

As a typical city dweller, it can be easy to overlook simple yet impactful acts of garden preservation such as weeding or socialising with people from diverse aspects of life. This mission offered the perfect excuse to do both by gifting us a loving and vibrant atmosphere where people could momentarily escape their hectic routines and dwell upon the peacefulness of reconnection with nature and other humans.

In the end, all we are, are creations of nature meant to connect while helping each other grow like a tall and magnificent sunflower.

On Wednesday evening we gathered at Charlton House, in an unusually negative spin for us at GoodGym - sharing our pet peeves. This evening we were joined by Sunaima and Lisa for their first group runs with us! WE ran to Prince Philip Maritime Collection Centre where Khursheed had a load of tasks for us, including weeding, watering, propping up a giant sunflower, giving the bug hotel a makeover and throwing some rubbish out. Jobs complete some of us ran and some of us walked back to base for a stretch.

Great work everyone!

On Saturday we have gardening at St Richard's and next Wednesday we're back for a Charlton House start to help with the garden at Hervey Road.

Until next time!

Tonight's GoodGym task took team Greenwich to the historical gem that is the Prince Phillip Maritime Collection Centre in Kidbrooke, home to the Greenwich Royal Museums' stored collections. These are made up of Art and Artefacts, and the centre is dedicated to their preservation as well as education within the local community.

Our first task this evening was a nautical one but we managed to stay on dry ground as we moved a slightly rickety boat into its new position. (Again on dry ground, it definitely isn't seaworthy!).

We were then led, crystal maze style, to our next adventure, in the magical mystery storage room, for some ceiling panel removal & replacement, ready for groups carrying out gilding of the panels. Our Man with the Golden Puns did us proud, quickly working out the jigsaw puzzle of panels, and we took turns climbing the ladder with instructions from the team on getting the placements exactly right.

I definitely think we got that crystal and caught some gold confetti!

Photo time with our prop of choice & it was time to head our separate ways. Thanks all & have a great week!

On a slightly balmy night this evening, 7 of us gathered at Charlton House for a run led by our very own Julian who was completing his fitness leader qualification and today was his test session! The story has a good ending as Julian passed with flying colors and might lead some longer run options ahead of group runs to help us get in training for the big half and on that note shout out to Sreyans for signing up to the big half! (okay that may be a lie but I'm speaking it into being - it's gonna happen). And seriously, congratulations on your second good deed - it was lovely to have you along and we hope to be seeing much more of you!

After a good run to the collections centre, Khursheed got us to work in the lovely garden where are task was to weed around the planters and empty many bags of wood chip to freshen up the the ground. The trick was to make a thick layer, the thicker the better and we managed to get through all the bags of woodchip, dislodging a disgruntled mouse and a fair few big spiders! 🕷️

A little while later the area was looking much more woodchippy and our job was well done- great work team. We might be back here soon to attempt to build a greenhouse- watch this space. Next week we're meeting on Tuesday at the Royal Naval College for a short run to the Village Church to help with weeding and a general tidy up. Hope to see you there!

Until next time, Rachel 👋🏻

It was Wednesday night, and under a darkening sky we jogged through Charlton park, fresh from our tales of our pet peeves. Our pet peeves were as follows:

Rachel: People playing reels on loudspeaker on the bus (whyyy???)

Sevan: people walking towards you when they cross the road in front of you (basically when people get in your way) - that's okay, we just run into those ones eh? 🤫

Sarah M: cars parking on the pavement (without good reason!)

Sarah H: ....I've forgotten yours Sarah - you'll have to add it in the comments 🤓

But the gist of it was, the world would be a better place without people. I had a neighbour once who introduced herself to me by saying she doesn't like people, she only likes cats. That's one way to stop your neigbours bothering you I guess.

Anyway, on with the show. Having had our task canceled this evening (get well soon, Khursheed!) our backup task was leafleting for the Woolwich foodcycle. We ran to the Woolwich Common Community Centre to collect the leaflets but they were no where to be found. Luckily I had a bin bag and Sevan had two pairs of gloves so we each donned a glove and litter picked our way through the streets of Woolwich, quickly filling a bag. A rather satisfying backup backup task, well done team!

And it was very lovely to have you touristing with us, Sevan - come back soon!

The mystery of the missing leaflets continues...

Next week is to be confirmed but this Sunday we've got a group run litter picking on Woolwich Common!

Until next time!

The sun was out and 4 GoodGymers made their way to Charlton House for Wednesday’s group run. After a short discussion on ice cream, we ran gently over to the Prince Philip National Maritime Museum archives to meet the wonderful Khursheed. The nature of the evening’s task had remained a surprise and on arrival it was revealed that first up was moving a very heavy box from the main building to the water tower. After much huffing and puffing this was complete and it was time for a GoodGym Greenwich favourite: replacing the ceiling panels in the touchable display room. Having removed the panels for gilding some time back, they had to go back in a very precise order according to the chart drawn up by Andy back in the day. We were soon done and it was time to leave but not before we were given a number of flyers for the archive’s community day on July 13th to hand out on the run home. It's always nice to get back to the archive and on our way out we were promised a tour of some of the collection on one of our next visits, so watch this space.

Has Good Gym gone lazy? Fear not, dear reader, the title of this report simply reflects another evening of hard work by Greenwich’s runners.

3 GoodGymers convened at one of our favourite places, the archives of the National Maritime Museum in Kidbrooke after a short run in changeable weather, we were met by the wonderful Khursheed and directed to our task for the evening, namely weeding and turning the soil over in two raised beds to make them ready for planting. Marta got straight to work on the weeds whilst Kerry and Julian got down to work turning the rock-hard soil to prepare if for growing, taking care not to cut any worms in two. After 45 minutes, the task having been completed it was revealed what was going into the beds and the archives are certainly being ambitious, with one bed containing exotic melons and the other ingredients for herbal teas: healthy peppermint and calming camomile that will put you to sleep even quicker than reading this run report.