The Olympics... and beyond

Saturday was my last full day at the PyeongChang Olympics. My last blog post was written on Saturday shortly after I left the Big Air competition at Alpensia Ski Jumping Center. I am writing this one about seven hours later as I sit in my apartment waiting for the laundry to finish up. When I left the Big Air competition, my plan was to come back to the apartment, do the laundry, finish packing and then go to a curling match tonight. However, not long after I threw my laundry into the machine, I realized that the US men’s curling team was playing for the gold medal in just a few minutes and why would I not go to that? So I left straight from the laundry room, bringing only my phone and my credentials and hopped on the bus to the curling center. I got there in the second end and was able to watch an incredible match and got to see the US win its first ever gold medal in curling. It was a great atmosphere and I thought it was a pretty fitting way to end my Olympic experience this ti...

I’m sitting in the Alpensia Resort Grand Ballroom, which has doubled as the Main Press Center’s workroom for the past two weeks. I’ve spent a lot of time here over the last 15 days, but as I write this on Saturday afternoon, I will be heading out of the resort for the final time. I still have another 20 hours or so before I have to get on a bus and then a train and then a plane back to the United States. I still plan on seeing at least one more event, hopefully two if I can swing it. But those events will be down in the Gangneung Area, meaning I will leave the mountain cluster in PyeongChang for the final time when I board the TM26 bus in a short while to head back to my apartment. The PyeongChang mountain cluster was a great location for the Winter Olympics. While two of the venues, Phoenix Snow Park and Jeongseon Alpine Center, were a good distance away from the Main Press Center, most of the venues were a short bus ride away and the mountain cluster itself was a much shorter bu...

The first realization that my Olympic experience was coming to an end came on Wednesday afternoon when I stopped in at the front office of the Gangneung Media Village to reserve my seat on a bus and then a train to get to the airport and Seoul on Sunday. I had submitted my departure flight to the organizers before I got here and they already had me in the computer. My flight leaves at a little after 5 p.m. Korean time on Sunday. They advised that you make your arrangements with the arrival and departure desk at least three days in advance and I figured it was a good idea to be earlier than later. This was confirmed to me by the older gentleman in line in front of me who was flying out today (Friday) and was just booking his train ticket on Wednesday afternoon. Of course, as one might expect, the train that got him there at a decent time was sold out, so he had to take an earlier train that got him to the airport pretty early, which wasn’t ideal to him. They have me on a 10:40 a.m....