I'd like to be fitter, honestly I would. I'm 37 years old, and a three-minute kickabout with the kids renders me a red faced, gasping wreck of a thing. The obvious answer is to exercise more, which is to say at all, and the obvious way to do this is to go to the gym. But - and I know I'm not alone in thinking this - gyms tend to be full of the kind of people who go to gyms. I know the exercises would be "doing me good" but the thought of being a bloke in shorts moving various bits of complicated metal to and fro, over and over again, in an effort to work up a sweat has me falling gratefully on to the nearest sofa.
Which is where the Green Gym comes in. Run by BTCV (the British Trust for Conservation Volunteers), the UK's largest practical conservation charity, Green Gym groups offer a way of keeping fit in the open air by engaging in a wide variety of activities, from clearing woodland to building dry stone walls via repairing footpaths and creating community gardens. They are supported by the Department of Health and work in partnership with the likes of the relevant primary-care trust and local authority, to make exercise and improved fitness accessible to people who wouldn't want to set foot inside a gym - like me.
There are 50 Green Gym groups up and running throughout the UK, all free. My nearest is based at Reddish Vale country park, which manages to create the impression of being a bucolic rural idyll while actually bordering inner-city Stockport. I'm joined, this drizzly Friday morning, by our project officer Jill Cunningham and five fellow Green Gym goers, a relatively small group as it's a working day. (On a Saturday they can get up to a dozen people.) What we lack in numbers, however, we make up for in enthusiasm, everybody else seemingly bursting with vitality.
"Today," says Cunningham, "we're going to be cutting back along some of the Trans-Pennine Way and clearing some steps that have got a bit overgrown."
Sounds easy I think, like an idiot. We walk to the tool store, load two wheelbarrows with tools for the job and set off walking to the site. Which is where the exercise bit starts to kick in. It's quite a long walk, the barrows have to be carried up some of the steeper sections, and by the time we get to where we're working I'm out of breath and sweating. And then we do the warm up. This consists of a few stretching exercises designed to a) prevent pulled muscles, and b) make me look ungainly and almost wholly lacking in coordination. I'm set to work, lopping overhanging willows that are crowding the pathway, and take the opportunity to find out why the others are here rather than pumping iron.
Sian Howell, who is 37, has been attending Green Gyms since January. "I can't remember my first session," she says, "but I remember the second. It was freezing cold and we spent it shovelling shit. I was aching the next day. It was fantastic." She was originally drawn to the Green Gym by a desire to do something in the environment. "I grew up in a rural part of mid-Cornwall and wanted to work in that kind of environment again, so this seemed like a great way of keeping fit. It's meaningful as well as physical." Howell says the idea of going to the gym holds no appeal. "Not at all. This is exactly what it says it is. There's no posturing, everybody just mucks in and once you start you feel so good, and the other people are really great."
Raisa Hovorun, who's in the country temporarily from her home in Italy, relishes the social aspect of the experience. She's 43 and naturally fit, listing cross-country skiing among her hobbies, but wouldn't dream of going to an ordinary gym. "I don't like being closed in like that. I see keeping fit as part of a natural, living process. Coming here you really feel the effect on your body and mind."
By now I've amassed an impressive looking pile of willow branches and the Trans-Pennine Way, or a few metres of it, is looking considerably clearer. More importantly, it's time for a tea break. Clearly a vital part of the Green Gym experience, today's tea break involves tea, coffee and eccles cakes - essential for an energy rush.
Afterwards I'm set to work with a spade, skimming grass and weeds from the top edges of a flight of steps cut into the side of a steep bank. This is what is technically known as Bloody Hard Work; I can feel the effects across my arms, shoulders, back and legs. However, the sight of a clear, well-lit flight of steps at the end of the session, where there had previously been a dark, uninviting, overgrown tunnel, is undeniably satisfying. All agree that having something to show for your effort, something that can also benefit other people, is one of the Green Gym's biggest plus points. It's nearly 1pm now, nearly time to pack up, after what's been the most exercise I've taken in a long time; hard work but satisfying (when you're hacking away at grass with a spade it gets extremely personal) .
According to research carried out at Oxford Brookes University, regular Green Gym sessions improve cardiovascular fitness and muscular strength by allowing people to work at an activity and pace that suits them. Felling or planting trees, or just plain digging, burns as many calories a minute as step aerobics. But this, in a way, is the obvious stuff. It's physical effort, and it's good for you, but it's provided in such a way as to appeal to people like myself.
Perhaps the best example of the benefits provided by the Green Gym is provided by John Swindells. The 47-year-old was pointed toward the Green Gym by the practice nurse at his GP's when it became clear that he had to lose weight. "I was offered swimming, an ordinary gym and this; and this was clearly the best. I don't believe in the proper gym itself - too monotonous. Here, we do something different every week. We've just finished clearing Himalayan Balsam - that was good fun." He's still somewhat overweight, but provides as much effort and enthusiasm as everybody else here. And does he feel fitter? "Oh yes. Fitter by a country mile. I can honestly say this is the best thing I've ever done. Absolutely." And with that, he gets back to work.
· For more details ring 01302 572200 or visit www.btcv.org/greengym
