Well it was a peaceful night in Wigan, as we lay in bed Diana said I am sure we didn't hear that noise last time we stopped here and 5 minutes latter it stopped. I had checked with the boat ahead and they were also set to go up the Wigan Flight first thin in the morning.
The alarm went off and we were up and had breakfast in time to leave at 8 am when the locks opened. The CRT man arrived dead on 8 and undid the padlocks so we both set off. Diana and the husband from the other boat doing the locks, with his wife driving the boat. She admitted to me she had never gone into a double lock with another boat before but she didn't put a step wrong. We got a nice rhythm going , we would enter a lock, Diana and the husband close the gates and open the paddles, I would tend the offside paddle while Diana walked up and set the next lock, both boats would leave through the nearside gate, her husband closed up and using his bike would be at the next lock as we came in side by side.
This worked all the way up to lock 78 when we spotted a single boat coming down with 6 crew. This would explain all the water coming through the bywash above us.
Although they were about 3 locks from us we waited rather than waste the water, they were followed by another pair who rather than wait for us to come up three locks turned them and came down so we had to wait for them in the next one.
By now the lock keeper and a new volockie arrived but as the lock keeper but only helped with one lock and had to go back down, taking the new volockie with him. We were soon back in the rhythm and going steadily up to the top, where the lock keeper and volockie were waiting to let us out at 12 o'clock.
We stopped at the top of the flight to fill the water tank and dispose of the recyclables. The locks end at a T junction, to the right is a dead end, this was the planned rout for the Lancaster Canal but it only went a few hundred yards, the locks come in on the right.
Our locking partners stopped for lunch but we carried on for about a mile out into the country side beside the golf course before calling it a day and having lunch ourselves. The weather was ideal for locking, dry with cloudy sun and very little wind, however this afternoon it is raining again, just like yesterday.
Today's Journey 
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