Click here: My pictures from the olympics
Day 1
My first trip to the Olympics also consisted of another first for me..my first flight on Alaska Airlines. I usually like to fly while sitting on the aisle, but when I head somewhere new I prefer a window. Luckily, my window seat gave me an early glimpse of the Vancouver airport and of downtown. As I saw these for the first time it got me more excited about the Olympics!
After landing, I had an hour to kill before my friend Brandi landed and we would head into the city. I spent it grabbing a bite, and more importantly by shopping at the airport’s official Olympic store! The first thing I ran across were some red mittens that I would later find out were extremely popular, guess I should have bought some before I headed into downtown as they were all sold out. I did, however, get to start my Olympic pin collection! As well as buying official Olympic ticket lanyards which were also sold out in most venues and stores in downtown. Not a bad start to my first day.
When I got to the B&B I had reserved I was happy to see it really existed! Haha, I had never booked a B&B before, or directly for that matter, so always nice to see when it all comes together as fact. Ended up being in a nice neighborhood and located only a couple of blocks from the Canada Line, the major subway that led straight into downtown! Even nicer, with a ticket to an event you get to ride free on the day of the event. After checking in (picking up an envelope with my name on it and a key inside) and unpacking a bit, I jumped on the subway and headed downtown.
As I walked out into the streets of downtown Vancouver for the first time I immediately sensed and heard the party atmosphere J The streets were alive with jubilant folks from across the world, and this Thursday afternoon would only be the beginning. After strolling the streets for a little bit and stopping at Robson Square to pick up some tickets, I was directed down to a different location where the line would be shorter, and it was 5min vs 1hr to wait to pick up tickets. Best thing about the new place where I picked up my tickets was that it was close to the Olympic flame, so that’s where I went to next. If there is one thing that Vancouver did not get right, and really this is the only thing, it is that the Olympic flame is behind boring old school fences. Behind the fences though, the Olympic flame looked great!
It was then time for my first Olympic event of the trip, that night’s Victory Ceremony! Getting through security was a breeze and got into BC Place early. It was a nice set up. I was able to see two Americans receive their gold medals: Shaun White and Shani Davis! Not bad for the first event. Also was able to see how the Canadians celebrated their gold medal winners, as Christine Nesbitt received the gold for Canada for the Women’s 1000M Speed Skating. Let’s just say the crowd went wild.
After the event, I headed back into downtown and went to look for my Stanford friends who were in town. First, was Aaron, after texting back and forth and trying to figure out where on Robson we all were at we ran into him. He then suggest hitting up a place called the Cactus Bar because he had heard it was a great place for “topless”… well that is what sounded like he said, but when we got there it seemed he meant “tapas.” Haha J He grabbed a bit to eat, we drank, had some edamame, people watched, and waited for others to show up, which they did. Kimen, Martin, Jing, and Tony. We confused the waitresses and hostesses by continuingly changing tables, from the patio to putting tables and chairs together inside. All in all a great night drinking and catching up….
Day 2…
The B&B I was staying at served breakfast from 7am-8am and then an alternate breakfast up until 10am… let’s just say I didn’t get enough samples during my stay to give you a review on breakfast there, I’m sure it is always great, did have French toast the one day I was able to wake up and get down there before 10am. J After waking up and grabbing a quick snack, I headed back into downtown Vancouver. Wanted to hit up the international Olympic store to see if I could find a USA hockey jersey, but no luck. It was very disappointing to see what was available: Ralph Lauren apparel, all too expensive in my opinion. There was a bunch of great looking apparel for Canada, and most of it seemed affordable. After the Olympic store failure, ended up hearing from Aaron and met up with him at a hotel restaurant for brunch. After reading that sentence you would probably assume it was at his hotel, but nope. Aaron had a Vancouver Tourism handbook that had coupons to certain restaurants and locations, this hotel’s restaurant for brunch had a coupon and thus the choice. Ended up being good! Empty place, but good brunch! J
Aaron was only able to score tickets to one event, Men’s Curling at 2pm on Friday, and only a Single ticket. Brandi and I were free until 7pm, for Women’s curling, so we figured we’d head over with Aaron and buy some tickets from a scalper, because seriously how hard would it be to buy tickets to curling? Curling was being held at the Vancouver Olympic center, which we discovered was located in the middle of a neighborhood, in what seemed to be a neighborhood park. We walked by nice houses and even an elementary school before reaching the venue. I wonder how the local residents felt about having the Olympics literally in their front yard. Everyone walking there was pretty good about sticking to the sidewalks.
So we ended up arriving at the venue about 2 hours before the event, figuring we had plenty of time to get some tickets. Boy, were we wrong. There were about 20 other people out looking for tickets, including a bachelor party that was celebrating in Vancouver with a shirt, bachelor party 2010. No one was selling! Even the scalpers were out with us regular folks trying to buy tickets off of the folks coming in. I even tried using my multilingualism. Although when I started asking in Spanish, “dos boletos por favor!” Aaron and Brandi mentioned that I was probably scaring people off as they looked at me strangely. What’s a Mexican doing at the winter Olympics?!? ;) After a little over 2 hours of trying to get tickets decided it wasn’t happening so headed back to the B&B to rest up before curling that night. After a short nap back at the B&B an early dinner allowed us to go get sushi!! I was soooo looking forward to sushi in vancouver, ended up going to a hole in the wall called Sushi-Boy. This place consisted of 3 tables and a bar. Small but good!!
After my tummy was full of sushi J headed back up to the Vancouver Olympic center for that night’s women’s curling event. Since we had tickets to this one, we had no issues getting in ;) One thing we did learn was that after going through security we would most likely be waiting for a while before being let into the actual venue. For curling, we were outside for about 10-15min. Not too long. The waiting was never an issue in Vancouver because there were always fun people around to talk to and learn about. At curling, ended up meeting a guy named Steve who was American and was attending his 8th Olympics. Apparently after his first Olympic trip he got addicted, I can’t blame him!
Finally inside, loaded up on some Canadians, the beer not the people! ;) That was one of my favorite things to say while at events during the Olympics, “I’d like two Canadians!” Curling was fun to watch. There were four matches going on at the same time, Russia vs Switzerland right in front, Japan vs Great Britain, China vs Sweden, and Canada vs Denmark. The Russians were pretty cute, young, not as skilled as the other players, started by giving up 4pts in the 1st end, but definitely cute! ;) Good games all around, but the Canada game was the top one. It went to 11 ends, which was good since their match took longer than the rest so they had everyone’s attention as they beat Denmark. Fun times! It was great seeing some of the amazing shots these women played. Great crowd too, lively, and in tune with what was going on. It just reinforced my love for curling. I definitely need to try it out.
After curling, headed straight to downtown (on the subway, where a bunch of random guys started singing the Canadian anthem, and threw in a $%# USA, until they saw me and apologized! Ha) and ended up stopping first in YaleTown and met up with Martin, Jing, Tony, and Kimen at a thai restaurant. Which had some pretty good pad thai. J We met up with a friend of Brandi’s and decided to head out to a bar. After walking around about 30min as Brandi’s friend directed us to a bar, that we never found, we decided to head back to the Cactus bar. As we got there I noticed there was a Nike store nearby, how did I miss it last night? ;) I peered in through the window like a kid outside a candy store, and saw that they had USA hockey jerseys! I knew where I would be headed the next morning. We ended up closing the cactus bar again that night, and more pictures in front of the moose.
Day 3…
After waking up, grabbing a quick bite at the B&B, and jumping on the subway, where do you think I headed to first? Yup, the Nike store! Unfortunately, they didn’t have my jersey size, XL. But they did have a L and a XXL, I tried both on and ended up going with the Large, I finally had my USA hockey jersey to wear proudly the next day at the USA vs Canada hockey game. Apparently while I was trying on the jerseys I missed my opportunity to see Wayne Gretzky up close! When I went to pay for my jersey, the girl at checkout mentioned that Gretzky had just walked in and out, so sad that I missed him. After the Nike run ended up exploring more of downtown until it was time to head to hockey! Day 3 was the start of my hockey package, 4 games in two days!!! Oh yeah!
After the shopping trip at the Nike store, I stopped by cosport to pick up my 1500m Speed Skating women’s final tickets I had bought. Then I headed straight for Robson Square so I could sell them since my tickets the next day for the USA vs Canada game conflicted. Selling tickets, apparently is a lot easier than buying. J Sold my two tickets off in 10min! For lunch, we ended up at the Lennox Pub, which was great. Stella on draft, irish car bombs at the ready, and good food! Had a great crab spinach artichoke dip and irish stew for lunch. Mmmm MMM! Such a great atmosphere, Aaron came over and joined us and we hung out until B and I decided to drop off our stuff from shopping and then headed to our first hockey game, Slovakia vs Latvia. Two countries that I really don’t know much about, but fun game. The arena was pretty packed, and the Latvians have great fans. I proudly wore my Ducks jersey to the game! Got to represent! Latvia got their butts kicked 6-0, but that did not stop their fans from cheering like wild animals. Even after the game as we excited you could hear Latvia chants loudly and clearly! They were just happy to be there and enjoying every minute of it. As we exited the arena, we were funneled out by a COSTCO! Quickly the smell of Costco hot dogs permeated the air. Guess what I had for dinner. Yup, a costco hot dog. Now, Canada costco has some different options: a Montreal Meat sandwich that everyone swore was horrible, a 1/2lb cheeseburger, and fries with gravy and potine! Strange! No polish sausage L sadness I know.
After costco dinner, it was time for the night hockey game, Germany vs Belarus, after passing security we had about a 20min wait, nothing compared to what we would experience the next day. The Germany vs Belarus game was much closer than the earlier game with Belarus pulling away for a 5-3 victory. I had picked the two teams that one that day! Slovakia and Belarus! There weren’t many Belarus fans in the crowd, but the Canadians seemed to adapt them for that reason and by the end of the 1st period there was quite a bit of cheering for them. When the game ended, Canada was loud and in a party mood. However, this night would end up being the quietest night of the trip.
Day 4….
The day I was looking forward to all weekend long. I don’t think I have ever been as patriotic as I was on this day ever in my life. I proudly put on my USA hockey jersey, wrapped a USA flag around my neck, and donned my USA world baseball classic cap. As I headed to and jumped on the subway there were looks from the left and right. Big smile on face, GO USA! Headed straight into downtown again to walk around proudly in my USA garb. The Canadians took down their hospitality a notch, saying things such as “hope you come in 2nd” and “have a good game, but not that good.” Got to love their trash talk!
Since we had such a blast at Lennox Pub the day before, decided to hang out there again until it was time to walk down proudly to Canada Hockey Place for the USA vs Canada game. Again, had the dip, several glasses of Stella, and tried their cheeseburger this time around. Good stuff. The manager even recognized me from the day before, although he too mentioned he hoped we would come in 2nd. Two random women, Karyn and Sandra approached Brandi and I and hung out with us for over 40min. Karyn even bought us drinks, a Caesar for each of us, a Caesar is a Vancouver drink that is very similar to a bloody mary, but better. I’m not a fan of bloody marys so the Caesar wasn’t that much better. Karyn, didn’t seem to mind as she happily took my drink and finished it. J You could feel the excitement and pressure the game had on the Canadians. Drank and watched the Czech republic vs Russia game on TV at the bar until we packed up and headed down …
As I approached the security lines a guy grabbed me and told me he wanted to interview me since I was a happy and smiling American. Answered a few questions for the CBC reporter, including how much over face value I paid for the seats for that night. No, I am not disclosing here, but was definitely worth it. Security wasn’t as bad I thought it would be, got through security in about 5-10min, but then it was time for the holding pen. Brandi and I waited here with everyone else for about an hour! It was fun though, the crowd was loud and proud, multiple chants of GO CANADA were started, as well as a few renditions of the Canadian national anthem. There was a even a beach ball, which they happily kept away from me, even when I asked for it nicely, “come on let an American hit the ball.” No luck!
If I thought outside was rowdy, boy I don’t know then how to describe the inside. Once everyone was in the place was LOUD. I know that is an understatement. A full packed house. 90% Canadian fans, 10% American, but we were loud when we needed to be, although our USA! USA! USA! chants were quickly drowned out with CANADA!!! But nothing quieted the crowd more than our empty net goal that wrapped up the game 5-3 for the US. It was so silent after the game, it made us uncomfortable to chant USA after we won. You could feel the sadness in the air. Slowly, the Canadians came out of it and started congratulating us.
In between our USA vs Canada and Sweden vs Finland games, we met up with Martin, Kimen, Jing, and Tony at fatburger! Haha. They had Stella at fatburger and coronas! Got to love Canada. Brandi and I told them about Lennox Pub, and then headed off to the Sweden and Finland. The Sweden and Finland game was the only game that I didn’t pick correctly! L I was rooting for Finland, as one of my favorite players of all time, Teemu Selanne, is a legend on their team. While at the Nike store the day before I was very close to buying a Finland jersey, very very close! J Too bad Sweden beat them pretty rough, even though the score was only 3-0, finland did not show up to play. Very disappointing.
After the game we contacted the crew to find out where they were….and guess where? Yup, Lennox Pub! They went there, liked it and stayed. And were still there 3 hrs later when we got out of the game. So of course we headed straight there and started drinking again! J They had made friends with some Canadian folks, and we kept meeting more people as the night went on. The Canadians were still sad about losing, but alcohol makes friends of everyone! Made friends with a fun married couple, Troy and Lori, in which we quickly made our friendship official by adding each other on facebook! Haha. Again, we closed another bar as we closed up Lennox Pub and then headed off to the condo the crew had rented for their stay. Goal was to wake up Kimen, since she had left earlier. Fun times, and a great last night in Canada.
Day 5….
How would my last day in canada be if it did not include a trip back to Lennox Pub to watch the USA women’s semifinal. Then spent the rest of the day walking around, looking at pins, and buying gifts. Which I still need to send out. Then back to the airport and back to the good ol usa.
Overall such a great trip, and really thinking about heading to the next Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, anyone want to join me?
Again, click here for more pictures: My Pictures from the Winter Olympics
