Sometimes life on the loop is like a Circus.


Today we (Katie and I with looper buddies Robin and Dan) decided to go on an ebike adventure.  We rode from Cortez all of the way to the Sarasota Airport.  25 miles round trip..

Here, across the street from the airport, the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus used to have their winter grounds.   Each year after a long tour season they would retreat with the full circus back to Sarasota.   
Technically they first started wintering in Baraboo WI.  That was cold, but close to home for the five Ringling Brothers (they grew up in Iowa).   Later they wintered in  Connecticut for many years before moving south to Florida.   

When you think of a circus I think of carnival operators.   This is different.  This family was anything but a poor family..   I never considered that in their day few cities had zoos and the only way to see exotic animals was when the circus came to town... 

The circus museum, art museum and home on the property was donated to the state of Florida in 1936 when John Ringling (the last of the brothers) died. 

John and Mabel Ringling had their own private Pullman railroad car made (one of 30 private cars ever built) and would travel in style with 1200-1500 people.
The circus was biggest before the age of radio, television or color newspapers.  A fan of the circus has spent most of his life building a miniature replica of the circus using millions of archival photos.  This thing is crazy. 

This a lifetime project for the guy who has built it and the Ringling Brothers would never let him put their name on the project.  Crazy.

Today it's the best way to see what it was like to move a three ring circus with tons of people and animals every day on multiple trains.    
 The logistics had to be crazy and they would set up, perform and tear down in a single day starting at like 3am and finishing late at night.   Different parts of the whole menagerie would run different schedules.  Four trains worth of people, equipment, animals etc. 
The cooks and food tents went first and would have preordered supplies in each town and they'd set up and cook before the rest of the crowd arrived.  

Apparently circus entertainment was profitable.  This is no humble abode.  In fact it's now home to the Florida State Art museum and administered by FSU.   
The level of excess reminds me of the Louvre in Paris or the Breakers in Newport RI.   Budgets apparently weren't a thing.  Of course the Ringling family invested heavily and made money in the great boom periods after the civil war and into the middle 1900s.  Oil apparently made them very wealthy and the stock market as well.. at least before the great depression.... 
There are 20+ large galleries of art in their museum plus a beautiful sculpture garden/courtyard. 
You can't see it from the photo but the courtyard looks out on a private lake and is backed in the end by Sarasota Bay.  Not a bad place to winter...

Of course the circus would not be complete without sippy props and a ton of activities to do. 
Fun was had by all followed by a great (but not low budget) meal on the property.  A good day out.  

We are back at the boat and tired...   And yes, there are boat projects to do.  There are always boat projects to do.  This week I tore out four sewer lines in the boat and replaced them (not without mishap).  We also got some shopping done and stocked back up while we had a volunteer to take us.  My friend from High School (Scot Moeckel) was kind enough to take us out for Thai and Walmart/Aldi.  These are things that are hard, if not impossible to do on a bike.  Thank you Scot!  It was good to catch up with how life is going.   It has been a long time.   Living in Bradenton is not at all bad...  Especially in January.
It is still 'cold' here but tough to complain when we see what Michigan is getting....
We are still looking forward to some actual sunny Florida weather.  We sat through another round of storms this week and had no damage.  My three new Isenglass windows arrived just in time and things weathered the storm pretty well...  

Still not moving... We like it here and will stay through January before headed south to Punta Gorda, Ft Myers, Big Pine Key and points beyond....





Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Youngs Point ON to Fenelon Falls ON

Image
We left Youngs Point lock wall this morning about 8am with two hours of cruising to get to our first lock.   What a beautiful day.   We had two lakes to cross.  Clear Lake (which is clear)...   And Stoney Lake which is.... Granite.  The beaches are done and the navigation is critical.  It's a common thing to have solid granite just a few inches below the surface on both sides of the boat just 10-20 feet away.  As long as we are in the designated channel it's fine....   But prop repair and replacement is a big business here... Still... Driving past this kind of scenery all day would never get old... (Until it froze).  Eventually we journeyed through four locks today... And up to a fifth.    Lock 28, 30, 31, 32... And sitting just under lock 33.   Yes we are aware 29 is missing.  28 and 29 used to be a set of two (a flight lock) but in the 1960s they automated it (hydraulic controls rathe...
Read more

Hastings ON to Peterborough ON

Image
Well today was the same.... And really different.   We left Hastings and traveled up Rice Lake for miles and miles.   What a gorgeous area.  Reminds me of the North Channel.  After many miles of cruising up the lake we hit something new.  WEEDS.  So thick they convinced the depth finder we were in 2ft of water..    We were literally mowing them.   And they eventually covered the water so thick you couldn't see the water and birds were standing on it... But that passed.  We just took it slow and ground our way through.  Eventually it turned into river again with fast moving water and less weeds.   It really doesn't suck here.   Such a beautiful area.  Twisty river, beautiful homes and cottages.   After four hours we reached our first lock of the day.  That was a long stretch of moving water.   We would run 10-11mph on the boat and get 6.2 on the water/over t...
Read more

Adventure awaits.

Image
Dan and Katie will be leaving for the Great Loop the first week of October.  We'll be living on the boat from mid-September until at least the end of June 2024.    Our plans are to travel 6000+ miles down the river systems of the midwest, around florida, up the east coast to New York, up the Hudson River, across the Erie and Oswego Canals, Lake Ontario, the Trent Severn Waterway (across the province of Ontario), Georgian Bay, The North Channel, Lake Huron, and then back down Lake Michigan to Grand Haven.   Katie has officially "retired" from NorthPointe Christian Schools.   Dan is taking a semi-leave of absence so that we can take this journey.   We're sure we'll miss our family immensely while we are gone but we do intend to make visits home and take a couple of breaks during our trip to "catch up".   How are we going to accomplish this?    On our newest BOAT, of course.   The Motor Vessel Sea-Ya became our trav...
Read more