05:00 and the alarm explodes into tune to wake us up. Within 30 minutes we are in the car on the way to Gainsborough Parklands parkrun. On the original plan this was a trip to the 7th birthday of Gainsborough Greens parkrun that we had done in 2024 and the ED was the host of the Airbnb pad that we stayed at. However, due to complaints about parking and noise, the event had been relocated about a kilometre and had been renamed as Gainsborough Parklands and this was event number 8.

Rory was not best pleased when the Satnav said arrival would be at 6:37. When we arrived nobody was in sight but we wasn’t too worried as we made our way to where we thought the start was, only to realise we were at the location of the old event. A quick trip back to the car and a rush round a few corners got us to the correct location with just a few minutes to spare. Time enough though for the ED David to notice our arrival and then to introduce us to the participants with reference in particular to our volunteering history.

Just before the start Simon Mackley, one of the presenters on the Parkrun Adventurers pod came over to join us as he was due to join us on our adventure. In addition parkrun Australia HQ staff member Mandy Oliver (Head of Event Delivery parkrun Asia Pacific ) joined us for a chat.

As it is still early in numbers there were a lot of participants so quite crowded in places. A good conversation was had between Hilary and Simon and a separate, but also good one, between Rory and Mandy.

The required Selfie frame pictures had to wait until the end.

A very long post event parkfaff occurred, close to the event location at The Whistlestop Cafe.

(Clicking on any picture will open it/them in an easy to navigate album but larger in size).