Sunday 21 February 2010

2010 Vancouver Olympic non-sporting winner! This Polish gentleman has been building inuksuit for the past 6 days! It is amazing to see all the different ones he has made. Some of them are small.
Some are quite complex in their design.
Some beautiful touches of an early Spring.
These Rhododendrons like to put on an early show.
Purple crocuses with bright yellow centres having an early visitor.
Softer lilac coloured ones.
Such intensity of colour found in nature!
Vancouver 2010 Olympic sights are quite amazing...Science world has been transformed by the Russians into Sochi House with line-ups to go inside several hours in length! Outside on the surrounding lawns are sculptures of figure holding fish made from tree trunks.
Some of these figures are quite imposing.
Welcome to Vancouver 2010 Olympics.
The city is blanketed by beautiful banners.
This inuksuk is one of many inuksuit that are being built along the edge of False Creek this week.
There is a Polish gentleman has been out every day for 6 days making them. I took these pictures yesterday. I think he is planning on building them until the end of the Olympics! I managed to delete his picture but I will add it to another post later. Here is a view of them in one direction.
There are even more the other way.
Some have some embellishments!
The city is blanketed with these beautiful blue, green and white banners and fences.
A cherry tree in bloom, I also saw a magnolia and a star magnolia in bloom along with some daffodils.
The Inuksuk symbol of our Vancouver 2010 Olympics.
Canadian and other flags decorating windows in this building
You can see some interesting dressed people around the city. These two were lining up for a restaurant..even though it looks like they are going into a tailor shop.
Here is the skating surface under Robson Square, notice the glass ceiling with the historic green roofed Hotel Vancouver in the background.
Notice the motif on the back of the stairs.
Here is another view of the other set of stairs.
Here is a view looking back down the stairs looking at the skating ring below. There is a zip line above the dome.
Here are two folk zipping by having a great time in the sun.
Here are more of the banners. They plan on recycling the fabric after they are removed.
I saw these two your girls walking ahead of me along Robson Street. Their hair covers the top words which are Together Everyone Achieves More. What a great thought. Her bag reads I really don't need a Prada bag!
I left Robson to head over to Georgia and down at the bottom of the street I realized I could see the Olympic Flame!
I managed to view it from a distance and get this great photo. The crowds around it were amazing. They have a viewing platform where there was over an hour wait to get closer.
Here is a shot of just the top portion of the flame above the protective fence around it.
Here are some large banners outside of our new Trade and Convention Centre.
This has to be one of the biggest Go Canada Go signs I've seen.
Flags from around the world are on display around the city. The Hotel Vancouver reflected in the glass building across from it.
A forest of lanterns are on Granville Street.
Lantern festivals are celebrated in our city.
This one was made of what appears to be recycled plastic bottles.
This metal fish and the one below were one creation.
The fish are set at a 90 degree angle to each other.
These colourful funky birds were amazing.
Pacific Centre is one of the major shopping centres in downtown Vancouver.
This has to be the larges Canadian Flag image I've seen, I like how they wrapped the building.
We're often thought of as living in igloos and this curved atrium entrance to Pacific Centre decided to play up the image.
An iconic building the Hudson's Bay Company building at the corner of Granville and Georgia dressed up for the Olympic experience. There was a huge line up to get inside the official souvenier shop.
One of the display windows featuring some scarves.
The banner reads Creative Minds to Invent, Competitive Spirit to Win.
What a great patriotic display of purses!
On Water Street I found a store with this lovely display of the Olympic Mascots. First is Miga.
Next is Suma the Paralympic Mascot.
This is Quatchi.
Another display with Miga. I didn't get one of Mukmuk!
After about 4 hours of walking the city, I headed home to watch some of the events on television.