After a day of fairly atrocious weather, the skies finally took pity on us and cleared just in time for our Tuesday evening mission to the Lighthouse & Gardens, hidden away behind the fences near Stratford International. If you’ve walked past without realising what’s there — trust us, it’s a brilliant little community space.

It was great to welcome Fuad and Eugene back after a few busy weeks at work, and the team set off on a scenic jog through the Olympic Park towards the gardens. A tube strike delay meant our host Sharon was running a little behind schedule, but GoodGymmers are nothing if not adaptable, so we filled the gap with an impromptu football skills session that definitely featured more enthusiasm than technical ability (speaking for myself at least).

Once Sharon had arrived and given us some directions, we got on with dismantling some rotten wooden planters that had seen better days. This turned out to be a satisfyingly varied task: digging out the soil, then deciding which demolition technique to deploy. Some sections responded nicely to careful unscrewing, while others required the much more cathartic “smash it apart and hope for the best” approach.

By the end of the evening we’d cleared quite a few planters, making a real difference for the small number of regular volunteers here, who wouldn’t have been able to tackle such a structural job themselves. It’s always rewarding knowing that our evening’s effort can make life easier for the volunteers who dedicate so much time to maintaining this valuable community space.

A lovely evening, a hidden oasis, and just enough dry weather to get the job done — we’ll hopefully be back in a couple of months to help again!

Check out all our upcoming sessions — including a bonus Saturday morning mission at Little Ilford Community Garden this weekend!

It was a warm one this evening, so well done to Adam, Graham and Nick for heading out into the late afternoon sunshine for a return visit to the Forest Gate Community Garden. When we arrived, Fiona our host asked us if we’d mind doing a particularly “nasty” task – having just run in the tropical heat from either Stratford or Leyton we were up for anything, although in hindsight…

She asked us if we’d mind emptying a large plastic water butt that had clearly been storing water since the dark ages – the moment the plastic lid was lifted, a swarm of flies escaped closely followed by a most unpleasant smell. Not to be deterred, we lifted the butt around the corner to the nearest drain and turned on the tap to start emptying it – it had a coffee coloured tinge to it, and downwind was still incredibly unpleasant – we followed it with a couple of watering cans as chasers down the drains...

This evening’s main event though was to get out and water the various planters that Fiona and the team tend to around Forest Gate – so armed with wheelbarrow, trolley and enough watering cans to open a decent corner shop with, we worked our way around the streets – with a convenient refill stop at the fountain to replenish supplies, and then on to the furthermost planters to give them a drink before heading back to pack everything away.

And so ended another successful evening at the gardens. Forest Gate Community Garden are hosting a garden trail on 6/7 June, and all are welcome to come along - further details can be found on their website (www.fgcommunitygarden.org).