From the Vancouver 2010 Olympics - My Visit

Hey, so every once in awhile, a writer has to pen something that just screams "Yea ME!" This is that article, courtesy of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, B.C.

There is so much I love about the Olympics, especially the winter incarnation. Just to let you know how much, I would take Olympic tickets over the Superbowl anytime.

I have considered attending other games - when I worked in the airline business I thought about trying to hop a flight on standby to a location, but there was always a reason why not to.

When Salt Lake City hosted them, thought about it again - and didn't go.

Vancouver is just too close. Not going to let that happen again!

Of course, getting tickets proved to be another story. I started looking too late for the early sales, and missed the deadlines. I was only finding "hospitality packages" that were prohibitively expensive. We are about a six hour drive away, so we didn't want to spend a lot of money to stay. Just drive up, drive back.

And then I got on an email alert list for last minute tickets, and when I saw a notification of ticket release in my email about 11:00 p.m. one night, I jumped. We decided on two trips, one on February 14th, and a second on the 28th.

On the first trip, we left around 3:00 in the morning, wanting to spend some time in Vancouver before going and seeing our ticketed event. We drove around the city, took the metro, rode a bus, walked around, people watching and taking in the sights on what turned out to be a beautiful day.

As a city, we were both very impressed with Vancouver. Great transportation, easy to get around, and very friendly people. In some ways it reminded us of European cities, but with a Pacific Northwest flavor. It's another example of how progressive thinking people can make a very livable city.

Then we took the bus out to the Thunderbird Arena for our game, getting there nice and early so we could take in the entire atmosphere. And a great one it was, with live bands, people dancing, and the "Ice Queen Supremes," who drew big applause.

Our game was between Finland and Russia, the women's teams. My wife was born in Russia, so we were rooting for the girls in Red. Although the crowd was close to even, there were more Suomi fans, including a very nice lady sitting next to my wife with a Finnish flag. The two of them had fun rooting for their teams!

I'll tell you what, Canadians know how to have fun at a hockey game! We had great seats, just a few rows behind the Russian bench. And although the Russian girls lost the game, we couldn't have had more fun.

If the event tickets weren't so expensive, we would go to more, but alas, we only have one more to go to. But it's a doozy - we have tickets to the closing ceremony.

We will do the same, but maybe leave even earlier to spend more time in the city. Could we afford it? On paper, not the best idea, but hey - we won't forget it, and we can pay the credit card off.