A Once In A Lifetime Experience….

After four attempts at buying Olympic tickets, Lee finally secured a pair for the Athletics, albeit at an obscene price!! I am not ashamed to admit that I am the least sport-minded person I know…I don’t even get excited about Wimbledon! But…even I could see that the Olympics in London was something special & wanted to experience it first hand.

We set off bright & early, even though our tickets were for the evening. Our journey could not have been simpler & it seemed as if the world & his wife were travelling to the Olympic Park! The ‘Javelin’ train from St Pancras to Stratford took just 7 minutes & then we were THERE!!

It was just as you’ve seen on TV & in the papers! Every volunteer ‘Games Maker’ was cheerful & happy to help. There was a total sense of enjoyment in the air.

  
   Once in the park it was very busy
   but so many people had entered
   into the spirit of things & I really
   loved this father & daughter effort!

   We decided to take in as much as
   we could of the park before deciding
   where to eat our lunch!

 
  

I loved these giant mirror
letters in front of the ‘Copper Box’…it was quite cloudy during our visit & the reflections were wonderful!

  

   The Coca Cola ‘Beat
   Box’…

 

 

…Lee & the Velodrome!

The whole time we were walking around there were roars coming from the various locations. Especially from the main Athletic stadium when Usain Bolt was running in a qualifying race!

There was a noticeable police presence throughout the park, but they all seemed to be enjoying the event as much as we were! The mounted police especially were getting a lot of attention & willingly posed for photographs!

 

 

   Every so often this team
   of performance dancers
   would break into a sport
   themed routine…a bit like a flash mob but without the music!!

And of course it had to be done! Lee striking a ‘Bolt’ pose outside the main stadium!!

 

 

   Sadly we hadn’t been able to get
   tickets for the ‘Orbit’ on the day of
   our visit, but it was still impressive
   from ground level! There was a lift
   to the top where I hear the views
   were amazing, but you had to walk
   back down!!

 
Then it was time to go into the Athletic Stadium! I cannot tell you how excited I was!!  In spite of there being eighty thousand people with tickets, the whole process was very civilised & we were soon inside!

 

  

 

   Our first view of the
   Olympic Cauldron was
   through an entrance &
   we stopped to take
   pictures, thinking we would not get such a good view again!

But once we got to our seats we realised that we were sitting a stones throw away with an uninterrupted view!

The stadium is amazing, no pillars, no columns…nothing to obscure your view wherever you sit!

 

 

   There was gentleman sat
   right in front of us who
   offered to take some
   photo’s of us together!

As you can see, I was overwhelmed by the cauldron…it really is breath-taking to see close up…

The position of our seats meant that we had a great view of the finishing line for all the track races & could clearly see all of the other events taking place too. We watched the volunteers setting up the hurdles with military precision…

 

 

 

 

…& then cheered as the race was run!

   This was the man we had
   been waiting to see…

   …Grabarz, Team GB!

   In Sixth Form College Lee
   had been County High
   Jump Champion, so this
   was the final he really
wanted to see. Grabarz had a good chance of winning Gold!

He did well, but was beaten to the Gold by a very impressive performance from a Russian Jumper.

He did however get to do his lap of honour for winning the Bronze…

We also got to see three separate Award Ceremonies…some of those National Anthems are very long!!

  
   Then it was all over &
   time to leave the stadium
   To avoid the crush we
   popped into McDonalds
   for a bite of supper
   before heading off in the
   rain for home!

And that, you may think, is that! A once in a lifetime experience…but was it?!!

Well, Lee had very kindly bought me an official Olympic scarf from Next, to wear & wave during our visit.

 

 

 

 

 

What he didn’t tell me was that he had posted a photo of me wearing it at the stadium on the Next Olympic Competition website….& guess what? He won a pair of tickets for the Paralympic Closing Ceremony on September 9th! So we get to do it all, all over again!! How cool is that?!!

Thanks for stopping by & come back soon!