As we knew our trip today wouldn’t take much more than an hour we spent the morning on housework boatwork and even washed the boat, well, one side at least.
We set off in the afternoon timing our journey to get through Plank Lane lift bridge before it closed at 4:30 pm until after the evening rush hour at 6:00 pm.
The bridge is boater operated but one lady thought Joy was the bridgekeeper and asked if she had a little hut. We waited for a few minutes for another boat which was filling up with water on the opposite side and two canoes full of kids so we would only hold up the traffic once.
From there it was a pleasant cruise into Leigh passing Pennington Flash, formed by coal mining subsidence and developed into into a Country Park. Even the course of the LNWR was submerged!
We reached Leigh in time for me to walk down the bank and pay in a tax refund cheque from HMRC (don’t get too excited for me it was only £40) and visit Poundland on the strength of it!