This was our third visit to the Old Baths site on Lodge Lane, with the aim of finishing off clearing all the overgrowth and years of layers and layers of litter from the back wall. The Seeds of Change project are working on a mural for the wall, telling the history of the site, from the original wash house, to the baths many of the older local community remember well.

Sallyann lead a social run with Ruth from Hope street and the rest of us either walked or cycled our way there meeting all together at the site.

It started raining shortly before we arrived, and continued to pour down throughout the evening, so we felt we were somehow connecting to the history of the wash house in getting very very wet!!

The excitement of the evening came in the shape of an old rusted safe we found that had been hidden in the overgrowth for who knows how many year. Try as we did, we could not get it open, but instead ran free with ideas of what might be inside, from gold from the titanic to someones head! We reluctantly left it in the good hands of the Seeds of Change team with a promise of a share of the goodies should they ever get it open.

Using cutters, hand saws and litter pickers we made wet progress in finishing off all but the final stump of the buddleia bush. Elinor (leading the project) had brought a power saw for her to complete it's removal, but given the heavy rain we all thought better of using an electrical equipment on this particular occasion, so we settled for cutting it back as much as possible and, thanks to Pauline and her hand saw, did a sterling job before calling it a day, freezing cold and soaking wet.

We're very much looking forward to seeing the mural take shape over the coming weeks now!

This week we returned to the old baths on Lodge Lane and to that bramble that defeated us a couple of weeks ago.

Five goodgymers met on Lodge lane in the sweltering heat to help clear the site of the old baths ready for a mural painting. We hacked through brambles and buddleja, only to reveal mountains of rubbish (9 wheelie bin size bags full!)

Eventually we rejoiced when we could see the wall that will be used for the mural. Well done team - you made a seemingly impossible task look like a breeze!

A small group of runners (2 to be precise!) met on Hope Street and ran the 2km to the Old Baths on Lodge lane, where we were greeted by 4 other Goodgymers and a whole host of the other volunteers.

The reason we were all there? To help Tmesis Theatre to clear the space ready for a mural to be painted as part of their Seeds of Change initiative.

As we cut back the Buddleja, nettles and brambles, we uncovered the tiles from the original bath house. We made quick work of one wall, but once we got to the corner, we were fighting with a giant bramble bush that seemed to have become the resting place for tonnes of rubbish. We will be back to continue the fight! (and not just because we were offered flapjack, promise!)

Well done to all those that helped out, it really made a huge difference and will enable the mural painters to get to the wall!

Tmesis Theatre will be holding a mural workshop this Saturday (2nd July) at 4:30. Feel free to attend with an L8 story and and object to talk about.