Under the Big Top

The Circus Royale is in town here in Albany, and, having not been to a circus since we were kids, we thought we'd go along. We booked tickets for the show last Monday afternoon, but Tropical Cyclone Bianca snuck down the west coast and was forecast to cross the coast at Bunbury last Sunday then reach as far East as Albany. We found it hard to believe that we could get a cyclone as far south as here, but the warnings were pretty strong and we prepared the van by putting away all our outside furniture and putting up the awning. The circus rang us on the Saturday morning to say they had cancelled the shows from Sunday onwards as they had to pull down the big top, and of the remaining shows offered to us we chose Friday evening.

In the event Bianca fizzled out before she even hit the shore, so all we had in Albany was a bit of rain, but the big top stayed down for a few days and no extra shows were scheduled. So last night we had an early dinner then headed down for the big show.

Circus Royale is an old fashioned, rather hokey, affair. The ring master had at least a dozen changes of clothes, each more garish than the last - our personal favourite was probably the bright lime green sparkly jacket and pants, teamed with a black shirt and lime green bow tie. No lions, tigers or bears, but they did have ponies, llamas, geese and small performing dogs. At one stage 3 big friesian cows lumbered around the ring then propped their front feet on ramps set around the edge. We had ring side seats, and hardly looked at the white pony that trotted around under them, so transfixed were we by the huge cow's head placidly chewing its cud right above us and quietly drooling on our knees. Tumblers, clowns, acrobats, a not very good juggler (the dropped clubs didn't appear to be part of the act and the ring master's wide smile became more and more fixed) provided all the fun of the fair. The grand finale was a contortionist who squeezed himself into a box that was probably only about half a cubic metre, amazing to see but also slightly nauseating. When the cast came out for the big bow it didn't surprise us to find there were only actually 10 performers, including the ring master, there did seem to be quite a repetition of faces over the different acts.

All in all, we had a very enjoyable night, and at $30 a ticket ringside the less than perfect touches only added to the charm.