Five top Newham GoodGymmers headed out on a lovely run up the canal to Hackney Marsh Adventure Playground, arriving to a warm welcome from Ange.

As ever, Ange was full of enthusiasm — a true champion for the playground and the young people who use it. It’s always inspiring to hear her talk about the space, the community it supports, and the importance of adventurous play. We caught up on her recent trip to the National Playwork Conference, where she got to hear her favourite anthropologist speak — including something about 2-year olds playing with machetes. I can't quite remember the details, and it isn't something Ange is planning to introduce at the Playground, but it did sound interesting... Alongside that, we heard about ongoing works since our last visit, which are helping make it an even better place for local kids.

Our task for the evening was a classic: tackling a mound of woodchip and spreading it beneath the zipwire. At first, it was hard to tell whether we were facing a quick win or a never-ending pile, but within 30 mins, the mound was no more and the ground below the zipwire safer, softer, and ready for action.

With the job done, we headed back along the canal, enjoying a relaxed run and a chat along the way.

We should be back in May for more playground fun, but before that we have a number of new tasks - first up next week is Forest Gate Community Gardens, where we’ll be helping get planters looking their best for a summer community garden trail. 🌱 Your help, as always, will be hugely appreciated - hope to see you there.

I'll admit that the correct use of (if any) punctuation isn't an essential ingredient of the average shopping list, until it is - on today's Mr R list he'd written Bananas Cheese...so I just had to check...

At the end of this morning's session, as we were packing everything up, and a small industrious team of little volunteers were token sorting on the ground, Run Director Rue turned to us and said he was a bit disappointed as he'd expected today's turnout to be "closer to 50"...you know you're in extremely tough company when today's actual total of 47 enthusiastic runners doesn't meet the RD's clearly very high expectations on turnout...!!

At 0855 today we had one runner, and about 6 volunteers, and were wondering what we would do if that proved to be today's turnout...but as the minutes ticked towards 9 the crowds appeared from all directions, and we definitely had a parkrun to organise. After a few callouts to the crowd for last minute Marshalls and a Tail Walker, we had all the essential volunteer roles filled and were good to go.

Rue led his now infamous (I'm sure this is what draws the crowd...) Hackney Haka as the warmup act, and it was impressive to see how many of the junior runners now know all the moves by heart, before timekeeper Johnny set them off on 2 laps around the sunny Fields. Marshall Nick briefly had to step in as Tail Walker when a large gap appeared after the final runner, but it transpired that the actual Tail Walker was doing his job perfectly by stopping to check on the welfare of one of our first timers...and soon caught up the back of the pack once again.

Another close finish for the top two positions (separated by just 2 seconds), and then a steady stream of happy faces appeared in the finish funnel - the spring like conditions (and the dried out mud) clearly were inspiring as we had 14 PB's...Rue was probably thinking it should have been at least 20... See you next week for more fun at the Fields.

My geography of northwest London clearly failed me this afternoon, when the friendly Mrs N handed me her very neatly written list and I asked which shop to aim for. There's a Tesco on Clifton Road she said, just a short walk away. A quick check of the map to make sure I was heading in the right direction and off I wandered...only to find myself in a very familiar Tesco that I occasionally shop in for another beneficiary in the area, but just approach it from a completely different direction...