Zirka Circus back for holiday thrills

Zirka Circus athletes wow the audience at Anderson Park in Napier. Photo / Duncan Brown

For those in need of some school holiday entertainment ideas, the Zirka Circus is back in town complete with death-defying acrobatics, clowns and magic tricks.

The circus arrived at Anderson Park in Napier on Wednesday and is scheduled to stay through until next Sunday, hosting two shows a day.

It features around 25 international performers, all highly-trained acrobats, contortionists and magicians, who twist and tumble in a variety of nerve-racking stunts.

The circus is owned and operated by the Hou siblings, whose great-grandfather started the circus and the Beijing-based training college that all the performers come from.

Jan Burnell, a lifestyle camper from Northland, has joined the group on their current tour of the country to help with administrative jobs.

Mrs Burnell said yesterday the performers were selected to attend the circus school at about five years old.

"They are from various parts of China and are selected at an early age to come to the school. They start their performance training and learn to look after their bodies as well as normal lessons."

She compared the performers to ballet dancers and said many of them would likely end up teaching their trade back in China in future.

The youngest performer on the tour was only 13 and the oldest 22.

She said rotation of performers was not relatively high but occasionally they did decide to return to China instead of signing up for another tour.

"Most of them sign up for at least one tour which is about a year.

"We've just started a new tour and lost five performers but they were replaced with another five."

Mrs Burnell said there was no shortage of performers willing to come to New Zealand.

Jenny Hou, part-owner and operator, said so far the tour had been very successful.

"We started a new tour in September and it's been very good so far.

"The performers are really enjoying it."

She said the most spectacular act was the wheel of death, where daredevils on motorbikes rode up the walls and roof of a cage.