There was lots going on at GoodGym Newcastle tonight. Former Area Activator Anji made a special guest appearance, only her third time returning since having screws inserted in her wrist after an accident. Possibly not ideal to be scraping paint off walls, but Anji scraped as much off as anyone else. Welcome back!

We also welcomed first time GoodGymer and student Muhannad. Not all of our tasks are quite so dusty. We hope to you again soon!

We also had a belated celebration of Aimee's 400th good deed, which involved meeting and stroking Ginny the horse. 400 good deeds is an awful lot of volunteering, with a lot of good done for the local community.

Before all of this, we went for a short run to show our support for This Girl Can's Let's Lift the Curfew campaign. Let's make sure that Newcastle is a safe place for women and girls to exercise outdoors all year round.

Next up for GoodGym Newcastle is a gardening task with Newcastle Parks on Saturday in Iris Brickfield Park. Please come and join us if you can!

Two GoodGymers leafleted for Heaton Pride in Heaton. This was our third task leafleting for Heaton Pride and the last of our leaflets. We need to get them out sharpish before the first event at 8pm that evening!

Luckily the streets in Heaton are long terraces so we managed to get hundreds of leaflets delivered within an hour allowing us to post a total of around 1,500 this week!

Anji completed three good deeds in one! As well as delivering hundreds of leaflets she also rang a doorbell to tell a women she had left her house keys in the front door and helped direct me out of where I was parked after as I ended up a bit blocked in!

If you are around this weekend check out Heaton Pride! We are also doing a litter pick to help tidy up after the event on Monday with a cheeky social after at the tipsy toad.

Tonight's task was a mega leaflet delivery for Big Local Gateshead, letting residents in the Teams area know about group cycling sessions led by experienced cycling guide Mark. Mark had already delivered a lot of leaflets so we walked away from the Tyne View Health Hub where the rides begin and covered millions* more homes in the Staithes area. It turned out to be a beautiful evening for a riverside walk!

The big news of the evening was the return of Anji for her first session as a regular member rather than as Area Activator, and her first since her recent accident. It was fantastic to have you back Anji!

We walked over 5k tonight - the perfect shake out for Michael who is running the Manchester marathon on Sunday. Good luck Michael!

It was also fascinating to learn that as well as teaching and guiding cycling, Mark does all kinds of dancing, including Angolan Kizomba, which was new to all of us!

Every day is a school day with GoodGym!

*Quite a lot!

Alas a big beginners session that was neither big nor featured any beginners! This one truly hung in the balance again today as we continue the cold snap and battle through January but four of us layered up and kept the good vibes coming.

It feels like a while since we were last at the fabulous Stepney Bank Stables and amazingly after so many times helping out here, today we were given a task we have never done before. I am glad we were all sufficiently wrapped up as today's job was outside in the container- basically like being in a big fridge in the car park.

After saying hello to the horses including super cute Sid and Sam, we got cracking with the task: weighing out and bagging feed using the two large (and fragrant) hay bales. It took us a little while to get into stride, checking the amount needed for each horse, bagging up, weighing, adjusting, weighing again. It was a really physical one today, easily the equivalent of about 100 sit ups and squats.

With about five minutes to spare, I remembered we also needed to log a litter pick to continue the relay, so I dashed off and cleared the entrance to the Stables car park too. Phew!

Spent a brisk 15 minutes making a start on clearing the grass area near where I live. There were so many cans I could have filled three bags but I just managed one today. Glad to have started my contribution to the January relay.

It has been a will they / won’t they sort of day as the weather has bounced between a little bit sunny (for approx 5 mins) to heavy hail, gale force winds and the ever present rain. I thought about cancelling the session about 20 times but knowing the hardy duo of Aimee and Lucy would be coming along I kept calm and carried on.

Tonight was our first group session of 2025 and finally my 300th good deed. Yippee! Fond of the fuss, I was delighted when Lucy arrived with a special banner for me to celebrate the occasion that seems to have been a very long time coming.. almost seven years in fact! Thanks Lucy.

To keep things simple and to keep the thread going of our January litter pick relay, we were heading out into freezing cold Newcastle to do battle with some rubbish around Leazes Park. It was lovely to catch up after our Christmas break and talk about what everyone has been up to, as well as plans for the year ahead. A very simple task made slightly challenging by the wind but before long we’d collected two bags of rubbish and we could definitely have carried on. Sadly the perimeter of Leazes Park is a bit of a litter trap so we will definitely be back.

A brisk walk back to base was the best I could offer for a fitness session tonight but as ever we headed home with a warm glow at staring our week so positively.

We’ve got a bonus group session this Saturday at Stepney Bank Stables. This is the perfect session for beginners so please share with anyone you think would be up for giving us a go in 2025. All the info is here.