Has anyone ever been to an Olympics?

[crimson77]

Is getting tickets a pain? Is there a housing crunch? I thinking of going to Sochi in 2014.

[Fawke Em]

1. Yep... Atlanta.

And, no, I bought the tickets locally (in Knoxville, TN) and stayed on the outskirts.

Nowadays, I'm sure you can buy online, but staying a ways from the venues probably is still best.

And, FWIW, I left the DAY the bomb went off, so I wasn't there when that happened.

[crimson77]

4. Sureeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[Brewinblue]

2. Lived in L.A. during the 1984 games

Tickets were very expensive, except outside the gates shortly before events, then they were pennies on the dollar.

[Retrograde]

8. But it was easy to get tickets to the soccer prelims - 400 miles from LA

I went to some of the soccer games in 84 since they were held at Stanford Stadium, walking distance from my house. Tickets were reasonable and easy to get. They even had a mini-closing ceremony at the end of the quarter-final match.

[JI7]

3. i hear it's difficult because people save them for people they know, but England had empty seats

because those tickets which people were saving for those they knew ended up not being used. a lot of people were angry because they wanted to go and were not able to get tickets.

[smirkymonkey]

5. I went to the Lake Placid Winter Olympics in 1980.

I was kind of young and went with friends and their family, so I don't remember paying for anything and we stayed in a cabin just outside of Lake Placid, so I wasn't aware of how difficult it was to score housing. Sorry, I'm not much of a help, but it was definitely fun, exciting and we met a lot of the athletes and collected pins from all over the world. It was a great time - If you can afford to go, I would certainly try. It's a rare opportunity and you won't forget it!

[pa28]

6. Yeah. I was lucky enough to go to the Beijing games and it was great.

Getting tickets was not a pain at all. Things like swimming go fast but you can get track events right up to the last minute and as long as you plan ahead you'll be able to take your pick of events.

Picking up the tickets was kind of a pain. You had to get them in a weird location far far away from the stadium. I think hotel rooms for the winter games might be hard to get so planning ahead is the key.

[HeiressofBickworth]

7. I went to Vancouver for the Winter Olympics 2010

Vancouver is about 2.5 hours drive from my little town. We were able to get tickets for only one event -- hockey. Fine with me; I'm a hockey fan. We saw Belarus v. Finland (Belarus went on to win the Bronze, I think). Vancouver was interesting at that time -- lots of street activities, art exhibits, and an area where they had free entertainment so even without event tickets, there was plenty to do. Housing was a problem. We are two retired old ladies and the price of hotels was simply out of the question. The prices go up when there's such a huge event in town. My friend found a B&B on Vancouver Island (and if you aren't familiar with the area, the city of Vancouver is NOT on Vancouver Island). It was a renovated basement in a fairly nice home. We were the only guests, lovely cooked breakfast in the morning in the dining room. The down side was that we had to then drive to the ferry dock where we left the car, take the ferry across (about an hour), take a bus to the train station and then take the train to downtown Vancouver. We had to watch the time at night to be sure we didn't miss the last ferry. So, I would say to you -- get your tickets as soon as they become available (watch their on-line sales), book a place to stay as soon as you confirm that you are actually going and don't overlook B&B's. A travel agent would be useful.

[JohnnyLib2]

17. Wasn't the atmosphere in Vancouver great? One big party.

We went to a prelim women's skiing event and wound up standing next to a Norway skier"s family and cheering with them. Good times!

[JohnnyLib2]

9. LA, Atlanta, Salt Lake and Vancouver

The ticketing process was more difficult each time; just keeping up with the timelines was difficult. Prices were high and going higher.
Still, we've enjoyed every part of each trip; there just isn't any other thing like it to my knowledge.
We stayed just over an hour outside of Vancouver and did okay after much research.

Definitely worth a look--but start early.

[trackfan]

10. I went to the L.A. games in 1984.

Two soccer games. I'm not a soccer fan, but I live near the Rose Bowl, and it was a fairly easy ticket to get. I also went to a baseball game, which was a demonstration sport that year.

[kestrel91316]

11. We lived in Tokyo in 1964 and my parents went to

see Track & Field one day. Probably not relevant to today's gigantor games.......

[Rochester]

12. No, but I saw the torch runner on June 17, 1996

at the corner of Culver Road and East Avenue in Rochester, N.Y.

It was around 2:30 p.m. or a little later, as I remember. There were people lined up and down the street. As we waited, a quick-moving thundershower passed over, just enough to get everyone wet and get the humidity up in time for the sun to peek back out. And then the runner came by, headed east on East Ave. It was a sight I'll never forget.

[RZM]

15. I had to cover the 2002 torch coming by for my job at the time

This was in January. It was really, really cold and early in the morning too. Not a particularly fun experience, but hey, you only live once

[fishwax]

13. I went to Salt Lake in 2002 -- it was a great experience and I'd love to do it again

The ticket process, if I remember correctly, worked on a lottery system where you could list and rank a number of events you were interested in and then they allotted tickets randomly, with a limit of three events--so if you didn't have the luck of the draw on the top choice it would go to your second choice and so on. It wasn't too painful, but it did take some time. The process is probably completely different this time around, though.

As to a housing crunch, I would say definitely. It was very difficult to find hotel rooms in SLC, which is (if I'm not mistaken) a larger market than Sochi would be. We actually only needed a room for one night, because my dad lived in southern Utah and came up for the weekend with his camping trailer to give us a place to stay, so that helped a lot. But empty rooms were very hard to find, even looking several weeks/months before the actual games. Expensive, too--even fleabag motels were going for 100+ a night. I'd recommend starting to look into housing now (well, whenever you make the decision to go).

[davidpdx]

14. No, but I'm thinking of going to the 2018 Olympics in Pyeongchang

As I'm only about 8 or 9 hours away. There is suppose to be a bullet train out there before the games start. I wouldn't mind going to one event.

[JohnnyLib2]

16. Good idea.

We've been twice with just a few event tickets (Salt Lake and Vancouver). That gets you into the international atmosphere and probably into plenty of extra display areas and more in the host city.

[Johonny]

18. Went to Beijing and Vancouver

It helps to know someone there and not need to find a place Did not have problem finding tickets it only takes $$$.