I love London, but London and the Olympic Summer Games is chock full of AWESOME!  My arrival was on the day of the Opening Ceremonies, so not surprisingly I was a bit tired, especially after the 2 hour line to collect our tickets from the CoSport will call line.  Plus the weather was questionable, so we decided to forgo the many live viewing sites and concerts for the comfort and convenience of watching it from home.  We could have purchased tickets for the actual event, but they were about $1500 each!!  And after seeing the opening ceremonies, I was glad to have the commentary and the cameras following all of the details of the performance.  Of course, I wasn't going to complain that right after the ceremonies, I only had to walk 20 feet to reach my bed!
This trip has been a year plus in the making.  I think it was April 2011 when we entered our names into our respective ticket lotteries - my friend in the UK lottery and myself in the CoSport official US lottery.  While my friend was lucky to receive allocations to several of her desired sporting events, I came up empty handed in the lottery.  Fortunately, CoSport held a "lucky loser" pre-sale for all their remaining tickets, where people who received nothing in the lottery had first shot.  During that pre-sale, I was able to acquire tickets to two Beach Volleyball events and one Diving medal round.  Throughout the time from the initial ticket sale to the actual Olympics, CoSport would randomly release additional tickets they acquired.  During one of those sales, I was able to gain one more ticket to the Tennis, Centre Court no less!
Now that we are here and the torch has been lit, it's time to let the games begin!  Saturday, we had our first event tickets to the night session for Beach Volleyball.  During the day, we tried to soak of some of the celebratory atmosphere -- heading to Tower Bridge to catch a glimpse of the Olympic rings hanging from the bridge and walking around the West End to try to find some of the Olympic mascot statues.  Visiting the actual Olympic Park would have to wait until the second half of the trip.

For Beach Volleyball, we had the luck of the draw and got both a Men's and a Women's USA team on Saturday night.  On top of that, the Women's team was two-time Olympic gold medalists: Misty May-Treanor and Kerry Walsh!
Brazil vs. Norway
Switzerland Set Point vs. Greece on Questionable Call
US Men - Gibb and Rosenthal
"You...no you!"
Two-Time Gold Medalists Kerri Walsh and Misty May-Treanor
Winners!
Tomorrow: More Beach Volleyball and some Tennis.  At Wimbledon for the Tennis event, I finally got my seat on Centre Court. According to the schedule, I should see Andy Murray and Maria Sharapova, at least, then two other matches unless I choose to wander around the grounds.  You'll find out tomorrow!