Zippos circus is back. Children need to be entertained so off we all went last week – three mums and 5 children – to a large car park on the outskirts of Brent Cross Shopping Centre for a good old fashioned trip to the circus.
These days we are spoilt for choice with children entertainment, but often prices are high for what you get.So it was a nice surprise to see the very affordable price of tickets ranging from £8-15 for adults and £6-12 for children.
It makes a very affordable afternoon out.
Norman Barrett OBE was the perfect host and compered the afternoon with great style and grandeur. He urged the audience to participate, react, and respond as much as possible.
The highly skilled jugglers, trapeze artists, magicians from Africa, Brazil, France, Japan, the Ukraine and the UK managed to entertain the kids for a good 2 hours. When we asked the kids (ranging from 4 to 9 years of age) what they liked best they all agreed that it was the Brazilian Lucius Troupe motorcycle Globe of death (and the pop corn in the interval).
Not one, but three motorbikes spinning around a globe without killing themselves. No wonder no insurance company wants to insure that act. Just to make it a little more exciting, a lady stands in the middle of the globe while the motorbikes spin round. It has to be seen to be believed.
So, whilst sitting in the rush hour traffic on the North Circular what was deemed the highlight of the show? Definitely the Globe of Death followed closely second by the acrobats, especially their limbo dancing, pyramid building and fire eating.
For my 4 year old, the ponies, budgies and the butterfly light stick that I bought her in the interval. It’s nice to be so easily pleased.
THE AUThor; Rita Kobrak www.mum-and-baby-experience.co.uk – Yoga and cooking holidays for mums and little ones.
Hi Rita, I really enjoied the Zippo’s Circus too. I have been there with my son, two friends and their children; I think they are very professional in how to manage through the many different activities, fluently and funny at the same time, creating a very strong suspance.
I have been to the Circus in Italy (the country where Circus traditions are very popular) and i must admit that i then looked back at Zippos and kind of thought they are doing a better job in trying and focus on human skills versus animal skills.
Circuses using animals, making horses dance about on their hind legs, is an outdated and cruel form of entertainment, shame on Zippos for still continuing to use animals! I also have to wonder what kind of a parent would take their children to learn to enjoy seeing animals being humiliated and forced into performing against their will? Every time animal welfare campaigners go under cover at these places they uncover abuses such as beatings and verbal abuse against the animals in training!
Lesley i agree with you with reference to the Italian circus that uses wild animals and sedates them to make them as the main attractions but zippos doesn’t. there is only one horse that runs around a couple of times and with a little girl that never whips him. really friendly performance. i am very passionate about animal welfare and i would not like circus because of that but zippos has moved on from that and now the show is based on human skills and risky performances. have you recently been at one of those shows?