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Bonfante Gardens - Circus Trees
Oct. 16th, 2005 10:59 pmEric's company got a deal for tickets to a small amusement park I've wanted to visit ever since it first opened a few years ago. Until today, I never found the time and the ticket prices just kept going up. It didn't help that they built it in Gilroy, which gets about 10 to 20 degrees hotter in the summer than it does where we live in San Jose.
The reason I wanted to go so much was to see the Circus Trees. I'd heard about them when I was a kid. They were on TV on You Asked For It. Axel Erlendsen, A man who emigrated from Sweden as a child had created these very special trees in fanciful shapes with methods he wouldn't reveal. In the early 1960's when I was begging to go there, he had 70 Circus Trees in his park.
At the time, they were in Scott's Valley, a lovely green valley right on the way to the beach for us, in a small amusement park called The Lost World. We could see the meadow of the park next to the freeway. There were two life-sized dinosaur statues in that meadow. Other kids said it was a really cool place. My parents never would take us. Santa's Village was at the same exit of the freeway. They'd taken my sister there before I was born and refused to take me there. They said it was a tourist trap and not worth the time. I could take my own kids when I grew up, they told me every time I asked.
I decided I wouldn't wait that long but both places closed before I was old enough to go on my own. Mr. Erlendsen was elderly and it became too much for him. He sold the land to a developer and died less than a year later. The land was fenced off and ignored. Many of the trees died. One fan was so upset that he would sneak onto the land and water the trees to try and keep them alive. Eventually, he was able to buy the land and saved the trees he could. Mr. Bonfante also loved the trees and when he decided to turn his family land into a garden park, he bought the remaining 40 Circus Trees and moved them to Gilroy. 25 of them survived the move. 19 of them are in the park, 18 where I could get a picture of them. The 19th nearly died and only this year is beginning to thrive. It has a fence around it. The only way we saw it was from the train that was moving too fast to get a picture.
( Thumbnails of the trees are under here. Click on them to see them larger. )
Neither of us felt well today. My asthma is really kicking for some reason. Maybe because our neighbor is burning stinky wood or those "aromatic" fake logs in his fireplace. I had to keep using my inhaler all day. Need to use it again now. I kept smelling rose oil at the park. Whether they were piping the smell in or it was on the people, I don't know, but it really made me wheeze. Eric had a backache that wasn't helped much by the bump on the one roller coaster we rode. He was filming the ride on his digital camera. Once he gets it into a downloadable form, I'll post it in my journal. It looks pretty good on his camera. Out of the four rides we tried to ride, three of them broke down. One was the train while we were on it. That wasn't too bad. We got to sit down for an extra five minutes in the shade. :)
Maybe we're too old and grumpy for amusement parks.
One fun thing was we ran into Tommy, our mailman. Tommy is cool!
The reason I wanted to go so much was to see the Circus Trees. I'd heard about them when I was a kid. They were on TV on You Asked For It. Axel Erlendsen, A man who emigrated from Sweden as a child had created these very special trees in fanciful shapes with methods he wouldn't reveal. In the early 1960's when I was begging to go there, he had 70 Circus Trees in his park.
At the time, they were in Scott's Valley, a lovely green valley right on the way to the beach for us, in a small amusement park called The Lost World. We could see the meadow of the park next to the freeway. There were two life-sized dinosaur statues in that meadow. Other kids said it was a really cool place. My parents never would take us. Santa's Village was at the same exit of the freeway. They'd taken my sister there before I was born and refused to take me there. They said it was a tourist trap and not worth the time. I could take my own kids when I grew up, they told me every time I asked.
I decided I wouldn't wait that long but both places closed before I was old enough to go on my own. Mr. Erlendsen was elderly and it became too much for him. He sold the land to a developer and died less than a year later. The land was fenced off and ignored. Many of the trees died. One fan was so upset that he would sneak onto the land and water the trees to try and keep them alive. Eventually, he was able to buy the land and saved the trees he could. Mr. Bonfante also loved the trees and when he decided to turn his family land into a garden park, he bought the remaining 40 Circus Trees and moved them to Gilroy. 25 of them survived the move. 19 of them are in the park, 18 where I could get a picture of them. The 19th nearly died and only this year is beginning to thrive. It has a fence around it. The only way we saw it was from the train that was moving too fast to get a picture.
( Thumbnails of the trees are under here. Click on them to see them larger. )
Neither of us felt well today. My asthma is really kicking for some reason. Maybe because our neighbor is burning stinky wood or those "aromatic" fake logs in his fireplace. I had to keep using my inhaler all day. Need to use it again now. I kept smelling rose oil at the park. Whether they were piping the smell in or it was on the people, I don't know, but it really made me wheeze. Eric had a backache that wasn't helped much by the bump on the one roller coaster we rode. He was filming the ride on his digital camera. Once he gets it into a downloadable form, I'll post it in my journal. It looks pretty good on his camera. Out of the four rides we tried to ride, three of them broke down. One was the train while we were on it. That wasn't too bad. We got to sit down for an extra five minutes in the shade. :)
Maybe we're too old and grumpy for amusement parks.
One fun thing was we ran into Tommy, our mailman. Tommy is cool!
