I have never been a gym bunny.

The thought of stumbling around on a treadmill, red-faced and sweaty, in a chilly, air conditioned room while trim and muscled fitness fans show off how bendy or strong they can be fills me with fear and loathing.

So to find out about the Wild Forest Gym, which is thought to be the only ‘natural gym’ in the UK, was a revelation.

No longer do you have to sweat it out on a cross trainer, you can dangle from monkey bars, run an 2.3km obstacle course through the woods, or throw yourself across a ditch on the jump course.

Coach Michael Cohen, 47, of Harrow, built the Wild Forest Gym, which opened in March, by hand during four months hard work.

He said: “This is the first natural movement and obstacle training course in the UK.

“I wanted to try and create a training environment that was in a forest because a lot of people get fed up at training inside.

“It’s different to training in a gym, it’s very natural movement and we pride ourselves on training people of all levels.

“We are going to see how we do here but may extend to other sites in the future.”

As well as the more energetic activities, Coach Michael has created a natural gymnasium, which pushed me to my limit as I balanced on ‘snakes’, crawled under logs on the ‘Lizard’ and tested my core on the ‘Twister’.

It was a brilliant session and actually achieved what I thought was impossible - it actually made me enjoy a gym.

Find out more at www.wildforestgym.wordpress.com or 07517604601.