A Trip to Wigan

For years I've written  occasional play reviews for a website called Remotegoat (don't ask me about the name - I must find out sometime). I don't get paid, but there's two free tickets and a programme in it for me, with drinks and snacks  if I review on a press night.

On average it take me about three hours to research and write about the performance next morning. I look up the play if I don't know it, (the Samuel French website is useful), plus background  on the  company and the actors.

'Curtain up on Murder' last night was the first play I've reviewed for over a year - another writing activity that moving to Southport interfered with.

It was on in Wigan, a town I haven't been to before but which is only half an hour on the train from Southport.

I'd heard of Wigan Pier as some kind of tourist attraction, and  I persuaded my partner to go early so we could visit. Sadly, although we went down to the canal-side site,  it was derelict . Even the nearby mill called Trencherfield only opens to vistors on Sunday.

Wigan has a pleasant market square but it was too cold to linger. We went into a shopping centre where we read in the Costa until it was time to eat in a local restaurant, picked from TripAdvisor on Google. It was a good choice, called Thai Corner, and our only regret was we didn't have more time to linger over the excellent food.

Thanks to Google maps we found the venue , St Michaels Hall, in a back street. The show was a most enjoyable spoof murder mystery. I posted my review to the  Remotegoat website this morning.