Dobbinland: The Paralympics

Back to the Olympic Park last Friday for Day 9 of the Paralympics - It's only 9 O'clock in the morning but lots of people were there.

We were going to the wheelchair rugby which was being held in the basketball arena. This is the view from the bridge to the big screen in the park which shows events from various venues during the day.

Looking towards the basketball arena and velodrome

First up was Australia against Belgium - the Australians bonding before the start

Introductions to the crowd

A Belgian bites the dust - they were very quickly lifted back onto their wheels. It was an easy victory for Australia (the eventual winners)

The second game of the morning was Sweden against Canada - winner to progress to semi-final; loser to go home. It was an amazingly close game - the fact that the athletes were in wheelchairs was soon forgotten - you simply marveled at the sporting spectacle.

On the Swedish side was a Mr Sandberg (No6, blond, nice hair, skillful attacker).

The game is played over our 8 minute periods - you can see how close this game was - Canada finally winning by one point.

View of the basketball arena on the way to the hill where we had lunch

After lunch we went back in to watch Team GB play Japan. As we didn't have session tickets for the afternoon,we could only get a seat high at the back. The picture shows warm up. Unfortunatly we were well beaten.

Views of the Water Polo arena (not used for the Paralympics), the Orbit and the Stadium

The Paralympic Village

View down the river towards the stadium.

Somebody has had a lot of fun with telephone boxes!

The Great British Garden by the side of the stadium was the result of a design competition by the RHS and London 2012.It has Bronze,Silver and Gold sections.

We went into the stadium at just after 6pm whilst it was still quiet
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The Olympic Flame

There are over 70,500 “pixel tablets” behind and between the stadium seats each containing just nine high powered lights giving the wonderful effects we saw at the opening and closing ceremonies.

Shot Put and Discus

Two of the remote control minis used to return hammer, javlin, discus and shot back to the throwing circles - each mini is 39 inches long.

Gold medal ceremony for Josie Pearson who won the F51-53 discus gave us a chance to sing the National Anthem

Stadium lights on as the sun sets

Richard Whithead - the double leg amputee and blade runner extraordinary who won the T42 200m. Unfortunatly the 100m we saw was too short a distance for him.