Day 3: Thursday, May 15, 2014

     Day 3 of the London part of the trip is probably the most Olympic oriented portion of our stay here in London. I know Michael already spoke a little bit about the Olympic Park but for the sake of the blog and the trip I feel the need to re-emphasize how freakin' cool it was. Our journey to the Olympic Park started off with a trip on the Underground to the newly renovated station created after London was given the 2012 bid to host the Olympics.

     The first thing you notice when you come out from the station is an absolute behemoth of a mall called "The Westfield". The mall is about five stories high with well over 75 stores littered throughout the mall, which is both an indoor and an outdoor mall. The most amazing fact about the mall is that five years ago it didn't exist. It was built specifically for the Olympics with the goal of creating both a massive shopping center and jobs. The best parts of the mall though were the bathrooms, which were fit for the Queen herself.

     From the mall we took the short overground train to the Olympic Park where we met up with Professor Ryan's doppelganger. His long lost relative and another woman named Sally provided us with a two-hour long tour of the Park, highlighting each and every Olympic venue, even the ones that were temporary such as the arena where they played basketball. The coolest building for me was the swimming arena, which according to our tour guide was supposed to look like either a wave crashing onto a beach or a stingray swimming through the water. We also saw the Velodrome and the Olympic stadium where they held the opening ceremonies as well as the closing ones too. The tallest building in the Park was the Orbit, which was a giant observation tower that stands 114.5 meters tall and looks like a roller-coaster.

     Following the tour, we decided to create "Syracuse" in the turning blocks on the wall outside of the stadium. Regardless of what you hear, it was all my idea and Professor Ryan said that it might make it on to the SU website!

     After the Park we went to go eat at Canary Wharf, another section that was renovated specifically for the Olympics. Canary Wharf then led to sight-seeing, with spots including the London Eye, Big Ben, and Buckingham  Palace.

     All in all, it was a fantastic day, filled with multiple sights and miles on miles of walking. To say that I'm looking forward to the next few days is an understatement. Stay tuned for the following blog posts because I'm sure they'll have even more to say then I did.