Whenever you attend the Olympics, you have to figure out where you are going to stay. Many of the people in the host cities think they are going to make a "fortune" on the games by renting their places. We also found what we think were "scams" of people posting fake lodging places. We found a number of places on Craig's List and made our final contact and confirmation with Julie on the Saturday night before we left to come out. Nothing like waiting until the last minute. Before I get into describing where we are, let me give you a little history of our lodging.
We stayed in Barcelona in an apartment rented by a college student who had stayed with my family two summers prior to the games. It was not the lap of luxury, but it was free and located about a two minute walk from the subway and we were in downtown in 10 minutes.
In Atlanta, I stayed with a high school classmate and we were far north of the city and it required a lot of travel each day.
In Salt Lake City, we found a woman on-line who decided to rent the rooms of her house after she placed third in the women's skeleton trials for the US and did not make the team. We met a super couple from Chicago there who we hung out with at several events.
In Athens, Christina found someone on-line who was renting an apartment for his brother who was going on vacation. The person renting lived in New York and his brother was in Athens. It was close to public transportation but a little work to get to events.
In Beijing, we rented an apartment from a business aquaintance of brother-in-law Michael. Ideally located right near a subway station in the business district of Beijing.
Here, we are in an ideal location. We are in downtown Yaletown. We are in a 2 bedroom apartment in a building that has a pool and hot tub. It is a couple minute walk to the subway and located across the street from LiveCity which is an entertainment center and a host to many sponsor pavilions. We are also close to many stores and food areas. It is also a busy part of town with a lot of people coming and going all day. It is not easy to arrange all of this. We have not seen a lot of events, but we are in the heart of the Olympics in a city that is bubbling with their success in the medal count. Canadian TV is constantly mentioning that Canada is winning in the gold medal race. We know that the US is winning in the medal count overall. Maybe the next blog I'll go on about the medal count.

Rick