It’s great to have a member of your Society who is also the curator of a nationally important museum so Trumble’s guided tour around Bolton’s Egyptian Galleries last Sunday was bound to be top class. Our trip out to Neil Coldrick’s excavations on Holcombe Moor was also a very enjoyable experience – view all the details here
Another great festival weekend with eleven bodies on our site at Toddingtons on Saturday and a further nine on Sunday – including a total of seven members of the general public. We also had a good number of visitors stopping by over the two days inquiring about our activity on our Well Site, which is on the west side of Toddington Lane at Haigh. 
We were looking for the old well marked on the 1849 OS but not on any later maps, and also evidence of the possible Roman road linking Wigan with Ribchester. You can follow our activities on our site diary here.
We bought our new drone in October last year after being inspired by our unusually dry summer. It was obviously too late for us to take advantage of those conditions but we have found plenty of opportunities to try out our new toy. This last week has been no exception – with the unusually warm and sunny weather for this time of year, we took advantage of the ideal conditions to visit sites north of Coppull at :-
Row High Wood and
Charnock Richard where the line of the Roman road extends towards Euxton – also
Pingot Valley where 4 years ago we looked for remains of The Arches viaduct, and
Dean Lock a new site for us on the Douglas Navigation where the remains of a river lock may have survived.
Despite the small turnout the trip was very enjoyable and we got to see quite a lot. The idea was to have a long distance trip similar to last year’s successful Orkney trip and Vindolanda, and the forts on Hadrian’s, seemed to be a suitable subject. You can follow the weekend event here
Great turn out for our summer trip this year which everybody body seemed to enjoy (helped no doubt in part by the fine weather. You can see all the details about it here
The weekend Festival and Open Day was a great success with a good number of volunteers and many visitors over the two-day event. Friday volunteer numbers were down (probably as it’s a weekday) but, on Saturday, we were oversubscribed.
Saturday’s volunteers and crew. Left to right: Chon, Tracey, Al, Darren, Alex, Vanessa, Bill, Patrick, Andy and Mark. Front row: Lily, Indiana (Bones) the dog and Lucas.
Throughout the two days we had a constant stream of visitors, particularly from the local residence who were keen to have a look at the Roman road we had discovered on their door step (encourage to have a look by Trevor acting as gatekeeper). It was particularly pleasing to see David Ratledge who hasn’t been too well recently – his Gazetteer of Roman Roads in Lancashire is quite comprehensive (and he’s currently working on roads in Cheshire – we all wish him well on this project).
Friday’s contingent: Left to right Patrick, Andy, Dave North, Mark, Dave Flanagan and Tony Boylan
Much Progress was made on searching for the Roman road between Wigan and Walton-le-Dale and you can see the details of our work here.
Great day out last Saturday despite the reduced numbers. It was the open day for the archaeological excavations which are being run by Liverpool University as training site undergraduates. More details here
Despite the wet weather last month’s Open Day was a great success with a good number of visitors throughout the day. There was also some emotion for one or two of the locals on seeing the road for the first time, knowing of its existence over the years – and, reminiscent of scenes from the Life of Brian, souvenirs stones from the site were going like hot cakes. More details here
Great turn out last Saturday for our Historical Graffiti survey of St Wilfrid’s Parish Church Standish. It was a great success and dozens and dozens of marks were discovered. 
The Church was built in the late 16th century and is the only Grade 1 Listed building in the Wigan Borough. You can see more details of our surveying activity here.
Wednesday 7th March. Talk on Bolton’s Egypt – Yesterday – Today – Tomorrow by Ian Trumble. There will also be information about this Saturday’s Historic Graffiti project at St Wilfred’s Standish and also volunteering for excavations on the Bryn Roman road site in the coming weeks (contact the Society for more info).