Inspired by the Slow Ways initiative that aims to verify a network of thousands of walking and cycling routes across the UK, Goodgymers from Bath donned their walking boots and took to the Kennet and Avon canal path from Bath to Bradford-on-Avon in Wiltshire.

It's arguably one of the most beautiful "Slow Ways" in the country. Meyrick, who selected the route, was accompanied by Cosmo, Jer, Mary, Ruth and Jane and her equally beautiful dog, Ted, who had more energy than all of us.

Along the way we enjoyed fantastic views. There were narrowboats with amazing paintwork and names, reflections in the water, wonderful scenes and lots of other towpath users, including four swans.

Jane, who is a boat dweller herself, bumped into quite a few people she knew too.

The main danger - apart from the fact that you are heading alongside a waterway - was probably from cyclists but they all used their bells - and one whistled - and we travelled without incident.

We think this was a record length of mission - more than four hours. It provided an opportunity for us all to get to know each other better and was time well spent.

I know I started to flag a bit in the second half of the journey and the prospect of making our way home but I brightened up at the prospect of a lift home. Big thanks to Meyrick who drove over to Bradford first thing and then came back on the train to meet us at the start.

There is a bit of a mystery in that the Slow Ways walk was advertised as around eight miles, yet, according to my Strava we walked 11.4 miles. This might have something to do with the detour we made along the Somerset Coal Canal for a light lunch at the Angelfish cafe.

We did lose one Goodgymer along the way but she went on to greater things. Mary, who is in training, left us near Avoncliff to do the journey back to Bath on foot. She could have gone the distance but was put off by the prospect of it getting dark.

Well done to Meyrick for organising the mission and Mary for her impressive contribution.

Note: You may wonder why I'm wearing a fez in the pictures - I'm taking part a fundraising challenge.

This afternoon we headed over to The Nest Project to help swap over their seasonal clothing stocks.

We were joined by a host of new GoodGym first-timers from the university - welcome guys, it was lovely to have you along. You are excellent and efficient sorters, not to mention very neat folders!

The Nest is a charity providing clothing for young children, to families with financial difficulties, and with spring beginning to spring (note: it was still flipping cold out today!) it’s time to put the winter range into storage and break out the summer clothes instead...

The long term storage is in cupboards downstairs, and the current range is set out in the room upstairs. So first up there was a bit of shifting to do. We split into two teams - one getting the summer clothing out of the storage, and another bringing the boxed winter range downstairs so that it can be put away in the newly vacated cupboard.

Then the summer range needed a little sorting and quality control. A lot of it is already boxed by both age and gender, but we had to go through those boxes just to double check. And also there were bags of new donations needing to be sorted into said boxes, before to finish up we had to take those boxes upstairs.

With something like 10 volunteers and the two staff, we managed to get everything done in the time slot, whilst as per usual being fuelled by some excellent home-made cake, and tea and coffee.

Today, we joined a bigger group from Grow For Life, to take part in a charcoal party!

Wooden pallets do a sterling job of work at the walled garden: pinning things down; keeping things dry by keeping them off the ground; helping keep things dry by pinning them under tarpaulins; making makeshift tables; all sorts! We seem to spend a lot of time moving pallets around the site, and have even learned special techniques for doing so! They've become like familiar old friends in their time.

But today, for some of our friends, their time has come to an end.

Wayne has introduced us to the fire pit on site before. A huge hole in the ground, looming menacingly next to the polytunnel, like a makeshift hot-tub where maybe Wayne chillaxes with a prosecco of an evening after a heavy day's work. Today, its time was just coming into being...

Our task was basically breaking up pallets. Sawing, crowbar-ing, whatever it takes-ing to break the pallets into nice neat wood blocks which Wayne was carefully laying into the now aflame fire pit.

Charcoal making is the name of the game. By carefully controlling the combustion process, rather than burning away to nothing, our pallet wood will become charcoal. Which will then be used as part of the growing cycle.

As a reward, we finished up with tea and bacon butties (vegetarian option was also available).

Wayne will still be on site for much of the day, long after we’ve left, carefully layering up his pallet cuttings, and making heaps of charcoal. Before chillaxing into that prosecco as the sun sets over Newton-St-Loe.... 🥂

Woo-hoo!

Big up to Ruth, celebrating a 50th Goodgym good-deed today! 🥳

Welcome

And a warm welcome to GoodGym newcomer Jean.

Also welcome back to Katherine, doing a first actual job of GoodGym work after coming along to last week's slightly abortive effort at hedge laying. Glad that didn’t put you off!

Today’s group run took us to the Skyline path to help lay some hedges.

Unfortunately, owing to some communication difficulties, we didn’t get to do any hedges today.

Undaunted, we turned those frowns upside-down (evidence: see animated slide show at the top of this page), and took lots of secondary benefits from today's activity anyway. We went for a nice walk instead, and picked up [a modest quantity of] litter along the way.

Old friends

On the way home I stopped for a coffee, and bumped into erstwhile Bath GoodGymer, Rob. As a result Rob has now signed up for Tuesday’s training run, on a if-he-can-find-time basis. Might see you there.. 😀

New friends

A warm welcome to first-timers Katherine and Isabelle. It was great to have you along, and fair play to volunteering to run up that massive hill as your first ever GoodGym interaction, Isabelle 👍