I was unable to blog this trip as I had originally envisaged. Instead, I have compiled my photographs into this album: http://tdac.com/London2012/index.html

Taking it All In

I am here to work, but on my days off, Iǘe made an effort to get to some games. A few days ago I was able to get a ticket to the Kayak Whitewater finals at the Lee Valley venue. This was very exciting. The Italians took top prize that day.

My next breat saw myself and my friend Lynne take the river boat up to Hampton COurt Palace. This was the site where Bradley Wiggins accepted his gold medal for the cycling sprint race the other day

Yesterday, my friend Ken offered me a front row, centre line seat for the Menś Hockey. We saw AUS take on ARG followed by NZL taking on NED. Very exciting and very very good seats.

I am working on a photo album for all of this but gettimg it uploaded is proving to be very hard. Stay tuned, more to come

Quick apology

Sorry to those who have email notifications turned on. Iǘe been lax in updating the last few days. I promise to keep that to a minimum.

The Torch is coming

After a full English breakfast (part of my room charge) I was sitting outside the hotel enjoying the sun. I couldńt help notice that there seemed to be way more people milling about or gathering. Up until now, London has essentially been a ghost town. The city has asked the locals to try and avoid the city while the Olympics are on; take a vacation, work from home. The message was basically stay away if you can. For each person that does actually leave, 3-5 more are going to come. The expect 1 million people a day to take in various shows. Probably one of the largest Olympics todate.
The crowds continued to form so I suspected something was up. I ran up for my camera and when I returned, the street looked like this:

It turns out, the Olympic torch was going to by right by my hotel.

Brad took us to the ASDA (supermarket) so we could buy lunch. There is absolutely nothing available to eat at the Neasdon Control Centre. Eating pre-made sandwiches is really going to take itś toll on me this trip, but we have little options. Once at the NSCC, we met the Express Medical nurse who would administer our DAMPS tests. We had to blow into a tube to test for booze and pee in a cup. That sample will be sent out for analysis for everything you can imagine and more. Once that was done, we settled back into our little office and worked on stuff from Toronto. Another long boring day ahead.
Well, at 6pm, we finally got a ´failure´ or disruption which required some action from Graeme and Jeni. They spent the next 90 minutes basically calming down the operators while a maintainer was sent out on the track for the repair. Part of the train carriage had caught onto our ĺoop´ cable and basically ripped out 100m of it. The repair was completed and the trains were back up and running. Some passengers experienced some pretty major delays getting home that night, but all in all, it was not that serious and had nothing to do with our system.
After the shift, Ken, Jeni, Graeme and myself enjoyed a few drinks and a couple of pizzas on the hotel patio. Itś a nice spot to unwind at the end of the day. Tomorrow will be a ŕest´ day for me. They have had to spread these out so we could maintain full coverage. My plan was to meet my friend Lynne, who is here for her grandmothers funeral, for lunch in the city. Should be a good day off.

First Day on the Job

Finally had a good sleep, if you call sleeping in a room that is 27 degrees C any good. It was better than on the plane at least. The air conditioning at the hotel is broken. Couldńt have happened at a worse time since it is 31 degrees in London today. My shifts will run from 1pm to 10pm each day, with 4 rest days scattered around. However, Shanty has asked us to go over in the morning for some orientation and name badge pickup. We met with a few of the LU (London Underground) people as well as our customer (Tubelines). Basically this was to allow us to put a face to a name since we will be working along side one and other for the next 3 weeks. Here are some of the other Canadians on this trip.

Ken

Mike

Shanty

Me again
After the morning session, Ken and I returned to the hotel and I finally got my phone unlocked and using my Orange SIM card. This gives me my UK number while here. I prepaid for a data plan (12& for 1 gig, alot cheaper than in Canada to be sure). Back to work at 1pm where we spent the next 9 hours essentially waiting for something to happen, which never did. I spent most of the time doing paper work for Toronto to wrap up unfinished business from before I left. The shift dragged on until 10pm. Time moves slowly when nothing is happening. Graeme and I had diner and a 1 drink at the Allso Thai restaurant near Wembley. Then it was off to bed. No drinking allowed tonight: we are going to be subjected to an alcohol and drug test the next day. This is law here in the UK when working on safety critical systems, especially the London Underground.

Sunny Skies in London

Our flight arrived at Heathrow, only to find a basically empty airport. No lines, no crowds. Going through immigrations took no more than 5 minutes. ´Brad´ our driver was waiting for us just outside and whisked us off the the Premier Inn at Wembley, my home for the next 3 weeks. Shanty, our faithful engineering boss has arranged that Brad drive us around, so we can stay off the tube (kind of ironic really).

I am traveling with 2 other coworkers (others to follow later); Ken and Haihong. After a 3hr nap, Ken and I headed straight down to London Bridge for a pint at our favorite pub, The Market Porter at the Borough Market. Honestly, I´ve never seen London so quiet. We spent most of the afternoon, taking in the sights around the Thames and London Bridge before heading back up to Wembley for diner. Ken when to his in laws place at Cannons Park and I headed to the ASDA market to buy some provisions. In bed by 11.

This is the view of Wembley Station, across the street from my hotel.

Round 2 - Here I go Again

Most people can only dream about going to the Olympics. I was fortunate enough to be a part of the fabulous Vancouver Winter Games just over two years ago in the role as a volunteer for the Alpine Ski racing at Whistler. (See older blog posts). Little did I know at that time I would get another chance, just 2 short years later, to go again, albeit in a completely different capacity.

I´ve been sent to London on a work assignment by my company Thales Group. Our division builds subway (tube) automation systems. I started working on the project 8 1/2 years ago to help get the Jubilee line running with greater capacity and reliability; all in preparation for these games (and the future of the line too). This is one of the infrastructure projects that will last long after the games are gone.

Iḿ sitting the British Airways Club lounge at Pearson Airport waiting for my overnight flight to London. While I am very excited about the next 3 weeks, I also know that I am going to miss my family tremendously. Kids, take care of your Mom for me please.