USA v Denmark

We apologize for not posting the last couple of days. We have had some late nights and early mornings and have not been able to sit down in front of the computer until today. Thursday was another great day for curling. When we arrived at the game it was sunny and about 50 degrees out. Almost too hot! We had to stand outside for a little while, after security, and wait for the arena to be prepped for our game. Melissa decided to take a quick photo of how nice it was.

As usual for every day they march in the girls with bag pipes and the CMP. You can see USA with Denmark in the photo above. Funny thing, our tickets are always right next to the Canadian team. So, I went over to where the U.S. was playing and was able to talk a couple Canadians into trading seats with us. Sweet Deal!

Picture of Natalie putting the first stone into the house. We had a few chances to seal the deal this game but there just seems to be a haze hanging around Team USA head's. I know they will pull it together though!

A nice picture of all the ice being played.

Well, to all our belief's that USA would prevail they came up short and lost the game. I think a little soul searching is in order. Hopefully it will help.

USA v Germany Part 1

Yesterday's game versus Germany was another nail biter. The US came up just short with a final score of 6-5.

Some of you caught us on tv-Keith's outfit combined with our 1st row seats put us in prime territory. They were really great seats and it was fun to be that close to the ice.

While the US was playing on sheet B, Canada was playing against the Japanese on sheet D, closest to our seats.

Team Canada Skip Cheryl Bernard

Team Japan

The Canada versus Japan game was also a close one and it was amazing to hear and see the fan support for the ladies. We were also seated in front of a group of Japanese curling fans and could listen to their team chants.

Sweden was playing Switzerland on Sheet C-also a great game.

Team Sweden Skip Anette Norberg

USA v Germany Part 2

There seemed to be more US fans in the stands yesterday, which was nice to see.



These guys got a Canada cheer started several times during the games. "Canada fans in the stands if you're here clap your hands, stomp your feet, shake your butts, & do all three. "

After the game, a group of us went with Deb & Pete to the P&G house downtown. It's a facility for the US athletes, their family and friends. We had some time to visit with everyone and relax. It was amazing to see the support provided by the sponsors. It's a great place for family to enjoy the Olympic experience with their athlete.

We stopped first to take some pics by Canada house. The mountains in the background provide a great photo backdrop.

At P&G house there are pillows that show each of the states. Keith was excited to find the Wisconsin pillow!

Rental House

We've gotten a few requests for pictures and info about the house we've rented for our stay in Vancouver. It's about 4 blocks from Queen Elizabeth Park and the curling venue. Unfortunately, the spectator entrance is on the complete opposite side as our house, so we do have to walk a little bit further to get into the gates. Only about 8 blocks or so-10 minutes by Keith's shortcut back way. It's about 4 blocks to Main Street where there's a grocery and dozens of restaurants. Unfortunately for me, about 3/4 of those restaurants are Asian influence, but we did find a McDonald's!

Anyway, this is our guest house from the back corner of the main house. It's tucked behind the apple tree and looks like it belongs in the garden.

This is the view from our door, looking back towards the main house. I'm sure the gardens are beautiful in season and we have several daffodils in bloom that greet us at the door.

The door opens onto the main living area which includes the bed area straight forward, a kitchenette to the left and a small table and television to the right.

The kitchenette has been great, allowing us to cook breakfast and usually one other meal per day. This has helped immensely with conserving funds! Everything here is very expensive. Keith spent $7 on one 12 oz beer!

The seating area also has floor to ceiling windows that let in the light and keep the room airy and open. It's very comfortable and well designed....perfect for the two of us.

The door to the right of the sleeping area is the bathroom, hidden behind a space saving pocket door. The sun shower is gorgeous, the only problem is the small tank hot water heater. You definitely want to be the first person getting ready!

Overall, we're very happy with the rental. It's a quick walk to the curling venue and a short ride on the Canada Line to downtown. We don't have to deal with as many crowds and we're tucked away in a quiet residential area. It's perfect!

USA v Japan

Today was the first Women's Curling session. We had a short walk to the venue, where we stood in line for about 30 minutes to get through security. Everyone is required to empty pockets, submit their bags to the xray machine and pass through a metal detector. Keith gets beeped every time, while I breeze right through, they told him it's something to do with his jeans.

The venue was quite full and the seating is very tight. You're definitely cozy with your neighbor. USA was on sheet 1, while we were on the opposite side of the venue. At least we were able to see the entire sheet, which was nice. There were several people sitting near us that had never seen curling before, so Keith was explaining many of the rules and scoring.

The Canadian women were also curling and the home crowd was very loud and into the game. The venue was filled with Canadian flags!

Team USA held the lead early, but Japan quickly tied the game back up. Japan was up by 1 coming into the 10th, while Team USA had the hammer. The game came down to the last shot where Japan scored 1 after a measure. A close first game that kept us on the edge of our seats.

Tomorrow our seats are in Row 1 so Keith has a loud outfit all set to go!

Jill-If you're still reading this-send us a quick note to Keith's profile email and we'll try to get in touch while you're in Vancouver!

Monday: Trip to the City-Keith

Monday, one more day before curling begins. Sigh! So, it was off to the big city. We decided to figure out how transportation is going to work to take us into the city. Our choices were bus or rail. We decided to try the rail; unfortunately that meant a 3/4 mile walk to get to the station. Once on the rail it took about 10 minutes to get into the heart of the city. It was amazing to see the underground network that they have to get into the large buildings.

We had several things in mind to do including some shopping at the Olympic superstore and picking up our award ceremony tickets. We had been watching on the news the line that forms to get into the superstore and we decided to check that out first. The line was 1.5 blocks long. OMG! I made the executive decision to try and come back later after we picked up our other tickets. OMG again! Another 10+ blocks of walking. Crap, my fat body is just not made for this much walking. LOL! But, I am a man and will show no weakness.

On the way we saw some very beautiful buildings including the one in the picture below. These are some very high priced condos on the river. I don't even want to know how much they cost.
On our way back towards the superstore we decide to see some other sites. This picture below is the Bell Ice Cube. It was nice building showing off Bell's technology. Oh, they gave us a very nice set of ear phones also.

After the Ice Cube we stopped at Live City Downtown, which was a bit of a disappointment. It is supposed to be a place where people who don't have tickets can go watch the games live on the big screen. So, they had one big screen, no seating and it wasn't even live. I guess there has been some public debate on this facility with how much tax payers dollars went into this facility and how little they received. Yikes!

Inside they had some Mounties shown in the picture below.

They even cut a maple leaf into the horses hair. Oh yeah, another 20 minute line to stand in to see this area. Needless to say we were both a little disappointed.

We decided to brave the line a the superstore; still 1.5 blocks. Amazingly though the line moved fast and we were in the building with only a 10 minute wait. That was the good part. Let's just remember that I am a man who when goes shopping knows what he wants, goes in the store, buys his items and leaves, quickly. I usually can execute this plan in about 1/2 hour tops. Good luck on doing that with this trip. It was chaos. I am sure Melissa was in her element having prepared for this experience by going Black Friday shopping for the last few years. I had a hard time even breathing. It was 2 steps, bump, excuse me. Repeated about 100 times. Needless to say I was all out of excuses by the end of the day. LOL The shopping trip lasted about 2 hours. Yes, Corey Mackey my ankles were swelled up like a pregnant women who was 9 months along. LOL

After the shopping experience, we decided to head straight to the UPS store and ship back some loot to our house. On the way we went past a Vancouver City Firehouse. The guys were cool and gave us a tour, patch and pin. The fireman were very cool.

After the UPS store we decided that we had spent about 6 hours on our feet and still had a 3/4 mile walk home. It was definitely time to go home and rest. We settled for a nice dinner and some beer to cap off the evening.

I would like to take a second to do some quick bitching about the USA clothing line at the superstore. Just because Ralph Lauren designs some clothes for you doesn't mean you can rip off the buyer to purchase some of your clothes. When a polo shirt goes for $160 dollars, you can kiss my... OK, that's enough, sorry about that. At least the Canadians know the value a dollar and are charging $50 for a polo shirt that has Canada on it. Maybe I will become Canadian...

Talk later and thanks for checking in.

Keith

Sunday Part 2

Today also brought us a nice surprise from Deb-passes to watch the Team USA women's curling practice. We enjoyed this immensely and a big THANK YOU to both Deb and Mark Swandby for coordinating the pass exchange!


It was exciting to see the venue in it's finishing stages. Watching the camera crews practice their techniques, the audio/visual workers setting up the big screen programming and the event staff continue to put on the final touches was interesting. Mark shared lots of interesting facts and information with us and we are excited for the event to get underway!!

When we came out of the practice session, we were amazed to see the clouds had disappeared and for the first time we were able to see the mountains in the distance. It's amazing to think that the mountains were there the whole time and we just hadn't had clear enough skies to see them. It was gorgeous.