Photos from the Civic Reception and party in Whites Hotel

          Carole had a brilliant night -thank you everyone that made it out, Carole really appreciated your presence. ( and we did too :P ) Sorry we couldn't put everyone in, but as you can imagine it would take forever.







Carole signing the book...

 Group photo

Andrew, Mary, Jessica, Carole, Mayor Davy Hynes Tim, Stella, Nicola and Town Clerk Pat Collins

 Some of the Councillors in attendance with the Mayor.

Cllr Joe Ryan talking to Carole

Mary heading up for her speech.

Rosarie being presented with a painting by highly acclaimed artist Karen Scannell (framed by Spectrum)

Billy Walsh giving his speech

Carole being presented with a plaque.

Edward, Carole and Karen.

Carole and Donal

Rachel, Donal, Liam, Carole, Daniel, Louise, Bridie and Aoife

Mary, Carole and Lisa

Billy Walsh, Carole and Larry O' Gorman

Tim, Noel, Seán, Diarmuid, James, Margret, Carole, Pauline, Teresa, Ewan and Gerry.

Mary and Carole

Carole, Shelly and Meadeabh

Bridie, Donal and Daniel

Nathan, Kelly, Karen, Nicola, Mary and Stephanie

Sinead and Carole

The Curtis Family

Kevin, Siobhan, Orla, Carole, Colm, William, Aoife and Sarah

William, Colm, Aoife and Sarah

Alfie, Dessie and Carole

Peter, Carole and Theresa

James, Carole and Jack

Carole and Phillis

Paul

She is home !!!!!!

Well at last Carole is home. We were at the airport to meet her an hour before the plane was due in. BUT we were still not the first in line to wait..... So with no lunch we took a spot near the front and held our ground. Along came Thomas and Claire with Jack and Kevin, flags big and small....Followed by Jim Roche much to Caroles delight.

Every time the doors opened to let people out after their flight there was a huge cheer and some very confused faces.! Some took a bow before exiting. The flight was delayed and finally around 1.30 a triumphant team returned.. No one would know they had been up since 3am. What a cheer they got. The smiles, the tears, the hugs, the kisses, a wonderful reunion.

107 medals between them, 31 Gold two of which Carole brought back to Wexford. Carole had difficulty getting out of the Airport as Philip Bromwell and two other reporters wanted an interwiew. We left the airport quietly and at the first roundabout was a huge sign with CAROLE RYAN GOLD in lights What a thrill that was. We thought Carole might sleep on the way down but the excitement was too much.

At the Beehive Carole was met by 5 cars all decorated for the occasion and inside were Pauline, Lilly, Nancy, Edel, Sarah, Paul, Jim, Karen and Kathleen and Paul. Carole was delighted especially when the horns started to blow as we left. Every opportunity we got we made noise!!
Carole was met by Ed (took photo to right) and Valerie at the end of Wexford bridge, much to her delight.

Wexfords Heroine was home and they were going to know it.

What an experience. Carole would like to invite all her friends who supported her so well to celebrate with her in Whites Hotel on Saturday at 8 pm. Please let me know who you are and if you will be able to attend. tmjcnaryan@gmail.com Thank you all so much.

The Waiting Game

For Kathleen

So from a simple start to a fantastic finish.....the games are over and we can flush the loo again in comfort..!

We arrived home around 4am. We were shattered but woke early. The excitement is going to kill us. Carole is all set to arrive in to Dublin on Tuesday around 12.30. The temperature there today is 40 degrees. Carole was at the Rhythmic gymnastic competition where Una and Barbara took more medals home. As someone said Greece is bailing out Ireland little by little. Carole got to watch a gymnastic demonstration which she said was fantastic . (Tim gets texts of congrats for Carole)

At this point everyone is looking forward to getting home. Tomorrow night is the closing ceremony. There should be a dvd available of the games later in the year.

Hungry Bird

At the Acropolis we fed birds. We watched them come closer and then this happened...

A day out.

Today we had Carole to ourselves for the whole day. =). So we asked her where she would like to go and she wanted to see the Acropolis. ... so we did. We took the tram and the metro and our feet and went to see the museum. After the museum we took a small train tour which brought us right up to the Acropolis. Carole was very impressed with the museum but the Acropolis was very difficult to view in the heat. Photo courtesy of Carole..

We were tired so we left there and got the metro to Neos Cosmos where we tried to get some food, unsuccessfully. The cafe told us they sell chips so we sat down. We were given water and had lovely fans blowing a mist of water on us. The waitress asked us for our order we asked for Chips and she said " I cannot serve you just chips" so we asked for the club sandwich with out the filling, and chips,,,,, "sorry I cannot serve you this....We do not have bread!!!!!"

We left there and went to Caroles hotel on the tram that was going in the opposite direction but only a short distance from the hotel we stopped the tram and got off. Carole was able to direct us to her hotel. She has 9 floors in her hotel and on the roof is her swimming pool! She said the views are amazing! The night sky is a beautiful red. She is served 4 course meals daily.

Before going back to the hotel Carole sampled some bbq'd Corn on the cob... Yum yum. and was back in time for dinner.!!

Some Pic's

Carole and Rosarie.=D Carole, Rosarie and Marie.


Carole :D Victoria, Carole and Gemma;] Carole and Allen =)

Mary, Nicky, Carole, Andrew, Tim and Jessie =]

Dot, Barbara, Una, Laura, Roy, Alan, Carole, Hazel, Pauline and Anita. (=

It is time to relax.

Today Carole competed in 4 disciplines. As most of you have heard she was terrific. The Asymmetric bars was Caroles first apparatus. then she had beam followed by her floor routine and finally the Vault.

She did a beautiful job on the A bars but the beam started shakily and the floor routine was not her best. Then came the vault and Wow what a job.!!!

We had a couple of hours to wait, then came the award ceremony. Carole came away with three ribbons and two gold medals and an incredibly proud support team. Unfortunately her coach Sinead from Wexford could not be there for today but Marie, Rosarie and Phylis celebrated with Carole and to our delight Kathryn was assigned to the awards for Gymnastics and Gemma made it over with a wonderful entourage of Irish supporters. Hazel ( head coach), Dot and Roy cheered with her Irish team mates, Alan, John Michael, Laura, Pauline, Una and Barbara. Una and Barbara have yet to compete.

Carole was a delight to be around.... and loads of people here just love her.... and why not.

TO POST A COMMENT, CLICK COMMENT AND TYPE YOUR NAME IN THE BOX WHERE IT SAYS "COMMENT AS" PUT YOUR FIRST NAME AND ENTER!!! thank you

The Boys competed today

          Today Ireland got its first Gold medal.. John Michael from the Irish Gymnastic team won gold. What a day. The competition was held this morning, and the award ceremony took 3 hours, with our Alan and John going up and down the podium!!!! Alan took three silver medals and some ribbons and John took a gold and silver and more ribbons. Their results should be on their pages on the website for Special Olympics Ireland.

          Carole was busy showing RTE where to find the people to interview,  i.e. John Michael and Alan... CEO Matt English was there to congratulate the boys, and watch the girls compete. All adding to the excitement.
          Miss universe 2007 gave out some medals.
          Gemma Carroll called in to say Hi, much to Caroles delight. Gemma is looking great, she has been seen singing in the corridors with other volunteers. She hopes to be there tomorrow with Kathryn to watch Carole do her stuff. Caroles competition should be at 7am Irish time. That is as much as we know for now.
          There is a 48 hr strike in operation until Thursday so our tram service has let us down. The taxi from our hotel took less than 5 mins and cost €3. The tram was free to us and took about 15mins. We were early for a change, fingers crossed we will be early tomorrow.....
          We will not get the results from Caroles competition till later tomorrow.
It would have been great to have Lisa and Ruby here, as they were a great team in Limerick.
                  We miss you Girls

Sinead says hi to

A big hello to Tony, Eileen, Mary, Sile and Andrew. Miss you! Hi second class glynn national, Ms Sinnott will be back soon!!

A lovely afternoon

This morning Carole had the start of her competition. She is being divisioned and we will get the time table for her competition hopefully tomorrow. I have to say she was brilliant, she concentrated on the job and did it so well. I hope Wednesday is as good.

We got to take Carole to our hotel for the afternoon. She swam in the pool and was so relaxed. It was great. Then she asked if we could have dinner by the pool... so we did. Greek omelette and chips, the first greek dinner I enjoyed.

Carole has swapped pins with more people than I can remember. She is delighted to say she knows people from all round the world.

The Ambassadors Do...

Yesterday we moved from the centre of Athens to the coast nearer to where Carole is training and competitions are held. The views are amazing. Last night the Irish ambassador and his wife, Mr and Mrs Charles Sheehan held a reception for the Irish Families and volunteers.There was plenty of food and of course some Murphy's... There we met Tim and Sam Schriver who willingly posed for a photo. They were lovely.
John Tracey was there as a representative from the Sports Council of Ireland. Not shy of the Camera either ....we got a photo!!! Thank you John.

Shook hands with lots of people and got the results of the Wexford match!!!
Oh we saw the Irish Garda standing on the runway at the opening ceremony .. We weren't expecting that...
At the opening ceremony mam saw Tim Schriver walking past and Yelled TIM he turned round and waved. He looked puzzled.
David ; The closing ceremony is on 4th July. Carole will be home on 5th. Her final competition is on wednesday. She is delighted with all the interest Thank you.

Message from Carole

           Hi everyone in Our Lady of Fatima School =) Hi Sheila, Michael, David, Gavin and Mighty. =) Hi Granny!! =) Hi Jimmy. Hi to Donal, Bridie, Daniel, Rachel and Louise. Hi Karen. =) Hi to Louise! Hi to Jane! Hi to Rebecca, Kiarán, Eoin and Daniel. Hi Gael and Ruby!! Hi Thomas, Claire, Celine, Jack and Kevin! Thanks for all of your comments!! Hi to all the family. Hi to everyone in Special Olympics Wexford. =) Hi Auntie Pauline I am having a great time.
Thanks for all the good wishes. I am with Mam and all at the hotel. Going for a swim now.
          

The Opening Ceremony

          I'm told the live streaming wasn't working well at all =S There should be a slideshow of pictures on this post hopefully. Most of the pictures are blurry but my logic is it's better than nothing??? Through all the jumping around the camera was nearly forgotten, but we managed to get one (out of focus) photo of Carole on the runway with the team. The excitement was incredible!! And through the massive crowd, Carole managed to see us and wave to us!!! Amazing!! She also pointed us out to team member Alan and to Coach Dorothy, and they also waved to us. =D

          It was great to see the whole team together! The ceremony was very good. It started with breaking
down the walls of discrimination, then out came all 7500 athletes from 170 countries in their teams. -Ireland were about half way through. Team Greece were the final team to join the parade. As they entered, doves were released. =) There were 13 sections in the 4 hour long opening ceremony, which we'll get a better chance to blog about at another stage. Carole didn't get back to their hotel until 5am last night and they were up again at 6.45am to be ready for divisioning today at 9.30am.

          Today Carole and the gymnastics section of the Irish team were at divisioning for the boys, Alan and John. Tomorrow the girls will have divisioning. -Another early day so I hope they get some sleep tonight!! We got to see Carole for a few minutes today while they were at divisioning, and she seems to be in good form. She's delighted to hear about everyone following the blog, and all the comments!! And she said to say hi to everyone =)

          Best of luck to all the athletes and I know they're having a great time.

Clever Pigeon

Clever pigeon!!
          The heat here is crazy so it's important to drink loads of water, and even the pigeons know where the cold water is!!

          

They've arrived in Athens!!!

The team have arrived in Athens and are settled into their hotel. The boat was quite rocky but they got over ok. Carole was saying there were people sleeping everywhere, in the few available beds, on the floor, in any chairs they could find and even in the shelves for the baggage!!!! Carole found a nice chair to sleep on =) They had a beautiful view on the boat too =) And as Carole said, it's hard to believe but there was a Vodafone boat out at sea!!

The hotel is beautiful and they have a gorgeous view of the sea and sand. Temperatures went up to 40° today!! They are staying with athletes from Pakistan and South Africa now so they are all having a great time making new friends and meeting a wide variety of people. I was surprised to hear that even the athletes from South Africa found the heat hard to handle... Tonight the temperature is about 35° where they are staying.
Traffic in Greece is mad, traffic lights seem to be ornaments, so if you're planning on visiting, -be careful!!

Snippet from the Special Olympics facebook page: Tomorrow nights Opening Ceremony will be streamed live by ERT World Europe from 8.30pm Greek time (6.30pm Irish time). As soon as we have the exact link to the stream it will be posted here and on the homepage of our website. Special thanks to our very helpful hotel Concierge who helped us navigate the Greek http://www.ert.gr/ website to get us as far as the above page :)

we arrived last night

We arrived safely last night, having met the green sea at the airport...Wow to see all the Irish volunteers heading over to our team that was great.

Carole suggested we drink lots of water and the food is lovely.

I have to agree on the water ....

Food?! not found it to be good yet.