I can't really explain my fascination with carousels. I just know that I've grown to really love them. The only place I can remember even riding one as a child was at Lincoln Park in New Bedford, Massachusetts and that place is long since gone. I may have ridden a few at the state fair but those memories have long since faded. My best guess is that is was always one of the few rides that didn't impact my fear of heights or my tendency towards motion sickness.
Now that I'm a big kid, I indulge frequently in my carousel obsession. Carousels have two of my favorite things: bright colors and pretty animals. Next month I plan to go on a carousel hunt through Paris. I have my list and my maps ready and I'm going to see how many I can get to in 10 days.
This is one of my favorites, the endangered species carousel at the Phoenix Zoo, which has not just animals but wild ones! Of course, my favorites are the big cats.
This one was at the AZ State Fair. It was really crowded and hard to get shots without kids in them. I finally decided to situate myself at the side of the carousel as far away as possible from the entrance. That gave me a few minutes to grab some shots before the kids swarmed all over it.
The Paradise Valley mall also has a beautiful carousel, made all the more special by the carousel cat with a fish in his mouth. I need to get back to this one for more photos soon.
This is only a small portion of my carousel collection. You can see many more in my Flickr album, including a cute coin operated ride outside of the dollar store!
