Summer Solstice mulches us together

It started to feel more like summer as Sam opened up Old Spike for Maria, Steve, Lindy, Cecilia, Gemma, Daryl and newbie, Robin. We welcomed Robin in after he came last week to do his document checks, but was raring to give GoodGym a try. Sam knew a few GoodGymers would meet him at Dawson's Heights, so as 18:45 arrived, he got going with his usual speech, but added extra bits for Robin to hear. Yet, before leaving Old Spike, his ice-breaker question which was to do with UN's Refugee Day, was: "What one item would you take with you if you had to leave your home immediately due to a war?"

Many of us opted for a phone whilst others had power bank, passports, swiss knife, backpack (empty, of course) and even a bicycle...

Berry Fun: mulching, watering and moving top soil

As we headed out to the Green to warm-up, Steve volunteered to back-mark to ensure no one would be left behind. After the warm-up, Sam led from the front taking the most direct route to Dawson's Heights, which included running up Underhill and then Overhill Road.

At the site, we met up with Ellie and some of the Dawson's Heights residents as well as Olive, Emma, Nathan, Andrada and Adrian.

This time around, Ellie had a few tasks for us to do. Firstly, Adrian, Daryl, Nathan, Robin and Steve took on the heavy lifting job of moving tonnes of top soil to fill two deep planters that hadn't been filled the last time we came. Andrada and Lindy followed the boys as they needed to get buckets and buckets of woodchip to help mulch the area around the berry saplings to give them a fighting chance and grow into big berry bushes! The third task involved untangling the hose pipe and feeding it to the water tank that had been recently installed. Emma and Maria put up their hands to do this job, which was rewarded with watering the plants afterwards. Finally, the fourth job was attended by Cecilia, Gemma and Olive. They went around the site to collect grass cuttings as this would be used in their compost.

The 40 minutes went by in a flash and we were all rewarded for our efforts with warm peanut butter cookies!

After our customary group photo, we dashed off quickly to see London's skyline from Dawson's Hill before we ventured back to Old Spike. We had an impromptu social at Herne Tavern as we were invited by Peckham Rye Junior parkrun team and volunteers, who were glad to see our group.

Thank You to all the GG-ers

A personal thanks from me to all those who came out last night. A massive thank you to everyone for getting stuck into whatever task you were given - sometimes we are spoilt for choice. Thank you to Robin for coming for your first GoodGym session and hope to see you again. Kudos to all and if I don't see you next week, see you soon!