Circus

I saw the Ringling Brothers Boom A Ring (Gold Tour) circus in Tallahassee on January 8th and the circus in Savannah on February 3rd. I hadn't been to the circus since I was a little girl. The reason I went twice in the span on one month is because my sister Karen knows the circus trumpet player and she was visiting him both cities and he got us free tickets to the shows and backstage passes to the one in Tallahassee.

It was a one ring circus...I will mention some of the highlights for me.....

I was amazed at watching the woman that did the rope stuff. She climbed a rope and did all sorts of poses from it, like holding on with just her legs and what not. Several times she wrapped the rope around herself in a specific way and then let go and her body spun over and over (either side over side or head over heels) and down the rope, stopping just before hitting the floor. Man, you have to get that just right or you will go splat! She also did maneuvers from a rope swing and she was swinging very high and fast.

It was also cool to see another strong woman do tricks on the rings. She would swing a lot and let go and be hanging upside by just her legs. Before her ring act, she did tricks with 6 big cats. She was the only one in the caged ring with those cats and she handled them beautifully. She went straight from the cat act to the ring act, just removing her fancy long coat and shoes. Usually people get a break in between acts, so I was impressed by her.

The 6 little dachsunds that did tricks were cute and funny. The music went really well with their running, hopping and twirling. I liked watching the elephants too. One woman came out riding the male elephant and had him do all sorts of things like standing on the stool, spinning and waving with his trunk. She stood and sat on him in all sorts of positions and it was so neat to see. She also went from the male to the female elephant and at one point had one foot on each one's head (which is risky). Nathan told us that the elephants need traveling companions and they use a zebra as one because they get along so well. At the show in Tallahassee, the zebra companion came out on stage with the elephant--so cute!

The wheel act was exciting and dangerous. There were 2 large wheels (like hamster wheels) connected with a long straight part so they could spin up and over each other (looked like an amusement park ride). There was 1 guy in each wheel. They'd run and jump inside each one as it went around and around and up and down. Then, the little guy got on the outside of his wheel and ran around it like that. He did lots of scary jumps as the wheel went from the highest point and started to go down. He got pretty crazy and there was no safety wires or crash pad for him. He even did some of it blindfolded!

There is a guy named Justin Case that is Australian (I met him backstage) but played a French character in the show. He came out quite a lot in between acts, wearing a coat and hat and carrying a small case. He rode a bicycle that kept falling apart (handle bars, seats, each wheel, etc. came off) and each time he'd put it back together all wrong and ride it like that. It was clever and funny. Just when you thought he couldn't think of any other silly way to put the bike together, he'd do another way and actually ride that thing! And sometimes he rode it while standing on his head! He said that he was the first one to ever do one of the tricks he did, which was riding it while sitting on the front of the bike where the handle bars meet the front wheel with the bike totally vertical. At one point, he pulled a tiny bicycle out of the case he had been carrying around and he rode it around the elevated walkway of the ring. This bike was so small (just bigger than his foot) it was incredible that he could even ride it (he put his feet on the pedals like normal). And later, he opened the case again and pulled out an even tinier bicycle. The entire thing was SMALLER than his foot and he successfully rode it through a flaming hoop. The crowd went wild! It was sooooo funny and amazing!

Hooray for the circus!