Zippos circus is in town. I’ve watched the posters go up and yesterday the tent being built, but kept forgetting to stop at the ticket office or go online to book. The opening night was a special offer of £6.99 too… as bright orange signs announced.
Picking up Andy from preschool, I had 20 minute to kill before going to pick up Angelina. I decided: we are going tonight if there are still places. I have fond memories myself of going once in a while as a child, so I thought it would be a lovely thing to do as a family.
Tickets sorted, we had a quick dinner and off we went. …It was a good idea to get there in advance as it’s free seating.
The tent is nicely heated, though a warm jumper won’t go amiss.
While we waited for the show to start we bumped into friends and chatted away the time.
The Ringmaster then came on and introduced the performers.
There were amazing acrobatics performed by Chinoa on the trapeze, by Nicky on her horses (including a beautiful retired race horse) and the Havana troupe, some very attractive muscular young men and young ladies… no I wasn’t really drooling… not consciously anyway! 
The acts and preparation of the ring for the next act was very skilfully tied together by the two circus clowns. They were brilliant! They had us in stitches. It was a pleasure to look to my side and see my 4 and 5 year old laughing so hard at these silly acts.
Norman our Ringmaster also took to the ring as a performer. He has the cutest act ever: he has a little troop of budgies who perform very sweet tricks. Makes you giggle, go “Awww!” and watch in awe.
Zippos has the obligatory strong man act, Hercules. As Hercules’ performance went on our jaw just dropped more and more. I won’t give away what he endured in weight placed on him at the end… will just say I was peering through my half closed eyes, hand in front of my mouth, holding back a yelp of terror for him being crushed.
The interval was proceeded by a bit of petrol-fumed, tire-burning antics of the Lucius team doing one wheelers and other stunts with their motocross bikes and four-wheelers. I wasn’t impressed, as I feared Andy or even Angelina would get the wrong sort of inspiration from the act. Plus I didn’t like the fumes. This was however aired out during the break.
The second half was even more spectacular than the first.
We had the Cuban group come back with even more high flying acrobatics on parallel bars and such. Nicky, the horse lady showed off more of her special skills with some horse dancing and riding astride 3 horses stand on their backs. Some aerial acrobatics by Jackie.
Again all this tied together with some very funny acts by the resident clown couple. They also involved 4 unsuspecting guys from the audience. Absolutely hilarious! All I can say I’m glad I wasn’t choosen.
The finale was performed by petrol-fueled, Lucius team and involved a large metal globe- the Globe of Death- with 3-4 motorbikes. Hair-raising doesn’t even come close to describing their spectacular act! It is truly a must see! …the video at the end gives an impression, but nowhere near the experience live
We had lots of fun at Zippos Circus. The kids woke this morning tired from a late night but still animatedly discussing the different things they saw.
If they are near you, I do suggest you make it an evening out with the kids and go see them…. some good old traditional family fun, with a modern twist.
Almost forgot to say they do a 30% off offer through Facebook. ( I know, ’cause they were handing out the promo as we left.)
Have you been to the circus recently? Did you enjoy it?