Friday night I went to the Moscow Circus. According to our tickets, camera were not allowed. However before the show they only said video recordings were not permitted. So I took a bunch of pictures (I am such a rebel). Most of them didn’t turn out. I kept the flash off because I didn’t want to be responsible for blinding a tightrope walker or ticking off a lion.

There were crazy clowns on a big bike.

Seals, I think. Dave knows the difference between seals and sea lions. I don’t. My favorite was the big fella on the right.

A flamanco balancing hamster wheel act.

These lions made me sad. There was one point where the man put his head in a lion’s mouth. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping the lion would Siegfried him (yeah, I know it was Roy, not Siegfried, that got mauled, but if I said “Roy’ed him” – would anyone have gotten it?). The poor lion should be out killing things and being king of the jungle. Maybe I should have used the flash for these photos? No, that’s not nice. I didn’t really want anyone to get hurt. It was pretty heartbreaking though to see these beautiful majestic cats having to perform like that.

The tightrope walkers were really great. At one point one of the men walked across the rope with two women balancing on his head – one on top of the other. They did have a net. It wasn’t a very big net though.

Those are all of the acts that had enough light for my photos to turn out okay. They also had a bunch of bare midriffed “cowboys” doing tricks on horses, an Arabian act with racing camels, ice skating trapeze artists, and limboing acrobatic Kenyans (much like the act we actually saw in Kenya).

And one last picture for you, here’s my hotel. The light display on the side of it changes. Note the double headed eagle, just like on that coronation gown. Since the sun sets so late here it was the first time I’d seen it in the dark, well, almost dark.

That’s it for tonight.  It’s already past my bedtime!  I’ll start catching up on today and yesterday tomorrow.