Eskilstuna… I met Max here in this little town about an hour away from Stockholm. They had the Nordic Fringe Festival where artists (circus, musical, theatre, etc) came together to perform in shows or on the streets for the public to see. Max and I saw many shows, we payed for some and then got a few free tickets for others (noice!). So we saw a few Variete Manegen shows… these are on every day and it's a mix of different performers. Some included silks, unicycling, juggling, handstands, dance, cyr wheel and stand up comedians. Of course most of the talking was in Swedish but I got Max to translate it.

We saw Victor Rubilar (from Argentina who resides in Sweden) perform on the streets. He is a football juggler and holds 4 Guiness World Records. Pretty cool huh? He is a great street performer, knows how to work the crowd. He juggled 5 footballs, which was quite amazing.

For the shows we saw Johan Welton, a famous juggler from Sweden and also a Guiness World Record holder. I think it was for bounce juggling 9 balls. But his show was really good. It was a comedy juggling show with a bit of pantomime also.

Patrik (Swedish) and Wes (American), a juggling duo act which was so awesome. Their juggling fitted so well with the music they used it was so entertaining to watch. Awesome juggling. And the crazy thing is that they are great jugglers now and they are both students from the circus school in Stockholm so they will be learning so much more which means they will be f***in' awesome when they graduate.

Oh the show called Night for One (performed by Sam Gustavsson) was fantastic. It was a mix of juggling, contemporary dance and so much more all mixed together in this one show. You got so drawn into this performance it was so amazing. Speechless…

Burnt Out Punks… hmmm… a bunch of crazy ass guys playing with fire. That's pretty much what it was. Not more to say.

De La Spratt Naked Ape had Max's former teacher in it. The show involved silks, theatre, teeterboard and gymnastics. It was a great overall show.

And finally the last show we saw was called Whoops! & Jan Unestam. It was a terrific show to finish our experience of the festival. It was a funny magical show. Quite amazing some of the tricks they were doing.

Oh yea and I forgot to mention we stayed at a couchsurfer's apartment just 5 mins walk from the town centre. So we were very lucky with accommodation. For those that don't know what couchsurfing is, it's where people offer their 'couches' as a place to stay (for free) for travellers. It's a great community and a fabulous idea! Google it!

And youtube or google the above artists, you'll see the amazing stuff they do.

So yes to sum it all up. The Nordic Fringe Festival was a great festival. I love watching circus artists and street performers and recommend all of you to attend any similar festivals or events that come to your town.

Anyways after Eskilstuna Max and I headed to Stockholm…