So the Olympics and Paralympics of London 2012 were over, but that didn’t mean the end of the fun by no means!!  Taking an extra day off work I stayed in London so that I could see the Athletes Parade.  Leaving our luggage at the hotel, I wandered onto the Strand to find it nearly deserted so went up to Covent Garden before mooching around to Trafalgar Square.  By the time I got there (having found a few mascots to photograph on the way), there were quite a few people gathering so I decided that I had probably better choose my place.

As the main part of the crowd was the Trafalgar Square side of the roundabout by Admarilty Arch I decided to go the otherside as it meant that I could get only 1 person back from the road and with a pretty clear view.  Now all that was required was to wait!  Thankfully the weather stayed (despite a few drops of rain) dry and not too hot so most of the crowd survived the long wait no problem.  I did see three people taken away, one by Ambulance, after collapsing but they were all awake so hopefully they are all ok.

Despite the wait, and the ever growing number of people and therefore getting a bit cramped on space, the crowd was in fine spirits and two sides of the road just along from where I was started chanting in response to each other and then they had a mini race between one member of each – anything to keep amused!  By this stage the police had pretty much closed off the road (apart from the Household Calvary that came past twice), and cyclists who got a big cheer (we were quite bored!).

At 1pm, the big screen in Trafalgar Square kicked into life and started showing the Channel 4 coverage (inc adverts) so we were able to see the parade leaving and making its way along and it was obvious that Trafalgar Square was not the only place that there were huge crowds, but they were all along the route – fantastic!!  The atmosphere was just amazing, and even the police were still on a high – police on horseback and motorcycles were even going along and highfiving spectators!

BA as one of the main sponsors were handing out boards to allow people to put a message on for the Athletes, and I eventually got hold of one that you can see in my picture here (taken much later on) :

I was starting to get quite tired, hungry and thirsty by this stage as I’d been standing in the same spot for 4 hours but despite having food & drink with me I didn’t want to move or have too much of it for fear of needing the loo and therefore having to move so small sips & nibbles it was.  Luckily, the parade finally reached us at around 3pm, just before which the people in front of me moved so I was able to get right to the front – lucky!

Seeing all the athletes was fantastic, and especially as it was just done by sport in alphabetical order with Paralympians and Olympians mixed up together – just as it should be.  It turned out though that I’d picked the wrong side of the street as most of the most well-known of the athletes were the other side of the lorry looking away from us as they went past as that was where most of the people and the press were – doh!  Still I managed to see quite a lot (when the guy next to me wasn’t waving manically in my face) and take a few photos and videos and I was very happy to be there to cheer and support the team.

Once all the floats had gone past, we mostly all stayed standing where we were and watched the Mall celebrations on the big screen but at least I was at last able to eat my lunch and have a drink without fear of missing the parade!  The flypast was great, especially the Red Arrows (as usual) and noone really wanted to leave after it was over.  I wandered over to Trafalgar Square and saw the Gamesmakers and other people still celebrating and dancing but they then closed the live site (boo) so we all had to leave but that didn’t stop the dancing!  I was pretty tired by now having been standing for so long so I decided to head off, weary but so pleased that I’d come and seen the parade and been a part of the celebrations for Our Greatest Team!  Roll on Glasgow 2014 and Rio 2016!!

(Some of the photos I took are on Flickr here)