Perth Royal Show

The Perth Royal Show is currently on. It's where you take your kids to pay a huge entry fee, pay over and above to go on rides, get ripped off at sideshow alley, pay double for junk food and pay showbags full of cheap rubbish. But you have fun doing it.

I worked in the morning and took the afternoon off so that the boy and I could go to the show. It only happens once a year and as a kid you need to go. Miky didn't want to go as she went last year. I rang Yu-Jin's best friend but he went yesterday. I called another friend but he had too much housework to do and sounded very tired. Oh well, just the two of us. I hate the fact that a family ticket only kicks in at two adults and two children.

The boy is a slow eater and took forever to finish his lunch. We missed a train by two minutes and then had to wait another 10 minutes. When we finally arrived at the show they were finishing the Freestyle Air Raiders, a motorbike stunt show, and that was the first item on my list to watch. Bugger.

We watched a bit of Horse Power - 25 riders with flags, whips and sparklers before heading over the wood chopping. After seeing two events we went to the rides area.

Wood Chopping 225mm Standing Block at Perth Royal Show 2007

This guy can chop wood and swing an axe!

Wood Chopping 300mm Underhand Championship Perth Royal Show 2007

This old bloke is fairly handy too but he finished 3rd.

First was Splash Down where we got soaked as it is a boat going around a circuit with two waterslides. Wasn't too bad but $9 each?! Just next to Splash Down were some clowns so Yu-Jin had a go. He only won some cheap plastic cars so wasn't too enthused by that. Then we had a go on the dodgem cars - only because the boy wasn't tall enough for the roller coaster because I definitely would have gone on that ride. Dodgems were quite fun. Other side of the way was Arabian Camel Race where you popped balls in holes to score points and make your camel move forward. You compete against 15 other competitors and the winner gets a large plush toy. Yu-Jin started with three points and his camel didn't move at all. That left a bad taste in my mouth - roguing, cheating bastards with sub-standard machinery.

Went for a wander and came across Power Surge - a gut-churning ride. I could feel my lunch moving around and the boy said that he felt that he was going to vomit. I'm glad he didn't. Other than that he did enjoy the ride although had no plans to do it again.

We went on the lookout for showbags. The pavilion containing knitting and weaving held no interest for the boy, can't understand why, so we didn't waste too much time in there. Showbags galore and we looked for the biggest one with the most guns. Took a while to find it but was the boy excited or what.

Decided that it was time to leave and on the way out visited the Scouts display and that of the Police. Both exhibitions were quite good.

A good afternoon actually. The boy enjoyed it and will certainly remember it, which is the main thing.