After a day of downpours the sun came out for our trail 10k in the Cotswolds! Peggy the dog kept us in check, getting a bit bark-y if we stopped for too long at the top of hills. 6+ miles of mud, hills, brambles, woods, and the odd branch-bridge, with a brief stop to borrow a coffee pot, led us in a big circle and back for coffee and cake.

Trails for breakfast is the best kind of morning.

Weed a treat in store on this week's Group Run (grooooaaan)...a longer run than we've done for a few weeks, some beautiful evening sunshine, and exploring a corner of Oxford that most hadn't visited before.

It's been a few weeks since we did group introductions, so with new people joining us all time it was definitely time to make sure everyone knew each other. Garland of Joy was awarded to Julia on the occasion of her 24th Good Deed (random number, as we missed the 21st!). Welcome to Laura and Miao, and welcome back to your 2nd run Faruk and Mark. It isn't easy to walk into a room of people you don't know yet and try something new, so thank you for plucking up the courage to give Goodgym a try!

This Wednesday's Group Run was to help OxGrow at Hogacre Common. OxGrow have a lovely community garden there, tucked away on the otherside of the railway line, where they grow lots of fruit, vegetables, and herbs. The garden is run by volunteers, and vegetables are donated to food banks in Oxford and the community cafe next to the garden, as well as being given to volunteers as a reward for their hard work.

2 miles of running over Magdalen Bridge, through Christchurch Meadows, and along past the South Oxford Adventure Playground took us to the edge of Hogacre EcoPark. Popping out of the tree line, we introduced ourselves to Simon, and were treated to a mini-tour of the community garden, getting a taste of fresh tomatoes as well as the (slightly less local, but highly appreciated) biscuits he'd kindly provided for us hungry runners.

We do love a task owner that provides water and snacks - it's a sure fire way to our hearts!

Our task for the evening was to weed and dig over a couple of beds which hadn't been used this year to get them ready for planting up with next year's crop. The beds were full of thistles, dry grass, and dried poppy heads, so we gloved up and got to work pulling out the less tenacious of the plants. Once weed pulled out the easier stuff (sorry, couldn't resist) it was time to tool up with forks and spades and get digging to remove the wilier roots. With half an eye on the sun dropping towards the horizon, and a determination to get the task done, there was some speed digging and plenty of dashes to and fro to the compost heap with armfuls of dried up weeds before we had to call time on the task. Buried treasures found: last year's potatoes, and jerusalem artichokes. Stepping back to look at what we had achieved we were pleased to see weed (last one, I promise) cleared both beds and dug them over pretty thoroughly.

Good work team!

After a few more biscuits (we'd worked up an appetite), some raspberries off the canes, and accepting a bag of treats from the garden, we had to go before we lost all the daylight.

Our run back to base was a particularly lovely one, taking us along trails and over the reservoir, with the sunset lighting up everything in shades of gold and pink. Picking up the Thames Path to Donnington Bridge we surprised random members of the public with a human archway to run through (fast becoming a new Goodgym Oxford tradition), before fartleking our way along the lamp posts of Meadow Lane.

There's nothing quite as lovely as a sunset run.

With chances of rain set around 50-50 for the evening, there was advance speculation on whether we would be raking hay while the sun did not shine, and probably while the rain soaked and the wind howled.

We should've had more faith in the weather gods though, as 6pm dawned if not sunny, then at least not apocalyptic.

Welcoming Mark and Olivia to our Goodgym crew, and admiring Helen's 50 Tshirt, on tour from Hammersmith and Fulham, we rattled through a bumper edition of news - Race for Life Pretty Muddy 5k volunteering, Oxford Half Water Station volunteering, post-work Community Mission next Friday, Garland of Joy for Trev for his 10th Good Deed!

It's an unavoidable fact that when headed for Rose Hill some uphill running is going to be required. Dancing around the Meadow Lane puddles we turned the corner and gamely started the climb to Iffley (eyes to the left for our beautifully weeded wall at Iffley Glebe). This is the hill route with a kick in the tail: Just when you think you're done it's UP again! You would never have thought Oxford was a city of flat running routes, as we all arrived at Rivermead Nature Park barely out of puff.

Ed and Andy from BBOWT were there to greet us in the freshly-cut meadow area. Tooling up with rakes and pitch forks we got to work clearing the cut grass. As first to arrive Trev was awarded the scythe, a position of responsibility that drew a certain amount of envy (note to self; find more scything tasks!), while Bethan demonstrated a new skill as a toad whisperer.

Watch your feet - the toads have come out to join the Goodgym group. Don't tread on our new friends!

The toad beneath the harrow knows
Exactly where each tooth-point goes.
The butterfly upon the road
Preaches contentment to that toad.

Thanks to Tim for the Kipling reference!

Half an hour of raking and we had cleared the main meadow area of cut grass, so upped the tempo to speed-raking, thanks to some motivational cheer-leading from Aoife, in order to get the boggy corner sorted in the last 5 minutes.

Upper-bodies worked out, tools stashed, team photo taken, and it was time to run again. The promise of a downhill run all the way back might have been a little white lie, as we started with a climb, but before anyone could catch their breath to complain we were swooping down past Iffley Church and onto the Thames Path.

Pitter patter pitter patter, over the lock, past the geese, over the humpback bridge, past the rowers, up onto Donnington Bridge, under Bethan and Aoife's human archway (hope the random members of the public got a little joy out of joining in), popping out on Meadow Lane for some more puddle-stomping. We can't run Meadow Lane without a fartlek session (tee hee, she said fart!!), so it had to beall along the lamposts; one sprint, one easy, one sprint, one easy etc, reconvening at Jackdaw Lane for an easy jog back to base, muddy legs inspection, and stretches.

Next week is a 2 Goodgym session week, so don't forget to check the list of Oxford happenings, and if it's your first time signing up for a Community Mission just double check that you're actually signed up after reading through the training information - you have to go back to the listing and click 'sign up' after you complete the training step.

See you next week!