Merci Paris – for Les Jeux, the Olympic and Paralympic Summer Games 2024 – for moments of joy and waves of admiration for all athletes in stunning venues. Grateful for two summers feeling the Olympic spirit, after being a volunteer at the Special Olympics 2023 Berlin.
The race is yours to run, at your own stride
This time in Paris was something else. Sport is amazing. Together with EURO 2024 from Germany, what a great summer to be in Europe. From 26 July to 8 September 2024, Paris has hosted the Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games. As it was written in the message I got from the Paris2024 app when the Games ended: “In 5, 10 or even more years, I’ll be able to say: I was there!”
I wanted to attend an edition since watching it on TV as a child, seeing Romania win many medals at gymnastics. There’s no better time like the present to honor a childhood dream. The best part as an Olympic enthusiast – you can support your home country or favorite athletes, and be open to learn more about other countries and cultures.
Games wide open
Before traveling to see the competitions I read that the French ambitiously tried and succeeded to make these Games more economical and gender equal than previous ones. Instead of building new stadiums and an entire Olympic village, mostly the existing facilities and historical venues were used to stage the competition. The scene became the city. The river Seine was famously used for swimming. Hence the slogan “games wide open”.
Plus, everyone was encouraged to use public transport or a bicycle. Many streets were closed to cars, and I actually chose to walk between the sites in the city center. And on gender parity, the 2024 Olympics was the first to have an equal number of male and female participants. Also for the first time, the final medal ceremony was for the women’s marathon.
While I am also being aware that with this type of massive sport events there are as well problematic aspects, both environmental and ethical. Since the Olympics is once every four years, there is both more charm and drama.
Stunning venues and numbers
Admittedly, I am still processing these memories that became a summer highlight and moments that are now some of my favorite. Feeling waves of admiration and inspiration for the Olympic and Paralympic athletes, for their discipline, performance, perseverance and dedication.
In total around 15 million visitors from all over the world saw 15,000 athletes competing in 32 Olympic and 22 Paralympic sports.
Talking more about stunning venues, Paris already had some of the most spectacular and recognizable places in the world. Only a few examples I noted below that caught my attention:
- Eiffel Tower Stadium, in front of a symbol of Paris – became an open air venue build for beach volleyball and blind football. While the beautiful Art Nouveau Grand Palais hosted fencing and taekwondo competitions under its green glass-roof, followed by Para taekwondo and wheelchair fencing. I was mostly refreshing the ticket resale page for these two venues;
- The road cycling and maraton competitions taking place from Hôtel de Ville in the streets of the capital or swimming in the Seine at Pont Alexandre III were free to watch for the visitors along the route;
- Grand Slam Stade Roland-Garros was used for tennis and boxing, while La Défense Arena for swimming and water polo, Château de Versailles for equestrian and Bercy Arena for gymnastics, and later basketball;
- Stade de France was the place for the closing ceremonies, but first for rugby and of course, athletics, one of the original sport that started the Olympics in Athens in Ancient Greece, with historic wins;
- And throughout France, since cities as Bordeaux, Lyon, Lille, Nantes, Nice or Marseille hosted several football, handball, basketball or sailing events.
Lastly, a unique novelty of this edition was the Vasque or Olympic and Paralympic Games Cauldron. The flame was in an air balloon that could be seen taking off at sunset from Jardin des Tuileries, between the Louvre and Place de la Concorde. Places to admire it with a great view were Place des Pyramides or Rue du 29 juillet.
“Le ciel bleu sur nous”. Walking between venues, I could think of Paris “blue sky over us”, just as in the song that Celine Dion sang at the Eiffel Tower, as a cover of Edith Piaf’s Hymne à l’amour“.
Travel Journal 
How amazing that you were able to attend the Olympics in Paris! Despite living quite close I didn’t go to Patis but I really wish I did, this really feels like a once-in-a-lifetime experience!
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Thank you for reading and for the comment, Juliette! At the beginning I thought I want to go because of FOMO, but after reflecting a while I realized I want to experience the atmosphere, even if only for a little bit
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