Olympic Games 2010, Vancouver – The arrival
I think, deep down, I was prepared for what was to come. I just didn’t want to face it until it was right in front of me. From the second our producer gave me the plane tickets to Vancouver and I saw the times of departure and arrival, I knew what it would be like.
I hate long distance flights. I avoid them whenever I can help it, which is why I never go on far away vacations.
I generally like flying, but definitely not for ten hours. I can’t figure out why I can’t sleep on planes, so I have to waste my time reading, watching movies, drinking, stretching. And it’s still annoying as hell.
This was a necessary intro if I want to stress how incredibly relieved I was when I landed in Vancouver after 18 hours. The first thing we had to do was to confirm our press accreditations which, in the last few years, thankfully took place at the airport; an incredibly practical idea. Next we picked up our luggage and were directed to the buses which would take us to Whistler.
This world renowned, up-class resort is the location to where the majority of the competitions will take place. It only made sense for my co-workers and I to find accommodation in the centre of it all.
Glad that everything was going so smoothly, I pushed my trolley towards the parking lot. I knew that I was facing yet another two hours of driving but the thought of a shower and a bed at the end of it all calmed me down considerably. That was the plan at least, before a young man with a fake Olympic smile informed us that the bus wasn’t there yet.
Five minutes, the young man told us. Two and a half hours later, when the bus still wasn’t there, I wasn’t the only one feeling borderline suicidal. All my co-workers from the Slovene National TV, our colleagues from Austria and the ZDF German crew shared our desperation.
Eventually, we did manage to make it to Whistler and this wasn’t to be the end of our problems. The driver wasn’t a local and by this I mean he had never yet set foot in Whistler. He did have a commendable desire to take everyone right to the doorstep of their hotel but since he didn’t know where he was half the time, this got more and more annoying. He typed the coordinates into his Garmin and then struggled with the town’s new driving regime, set up for the Olympics. When we did manage to find a hotel, it was usually located at the end of a series of narrow roads and passages and took forever to get back out again. Long story short, 7 hours after landing in Vancouver I got to my hotel room, too tired to even get upset.
The next morning when I woke up, Whistler was looking better than ever in the morning sunlight. I’ll write about the town itself later, for now I’ll just say that it’s very clean and there are two vast skiing areas on either side of the town. When I manage to find some free time during the day, I’ll definitely try out what the skiing is like here. That is, if the weather will get any better. Rain and overcast weather are coming in from Hawaii, the organisers haven’t managed to set up the men’s downhill training and the forecast is even worse for the upcoming days. It seems that even the backup plans and basic schedules for competitions will have to be altered.
The conditions are similar to Europe’s spring but it isn’t clear how long this bad weather will last. At the speed with which the weather changes around here, it might be that we will complain about excess snow in just a few days. The official opening ceremony is drawing nearer and nearer, the athletes have arrived and the spectators are gathering. The games can begin and we just need the weather to cooperate.
