Sydney Olympic Park

On Saturday I ventured out to Olympic Park, to have a tour of the 2000 Olympic grounds. The tour is fairly well-organised, where you can either take a guided tour or a self-guided tour with audio. I opted for the self-guided tour, which was smart as I spent almost 3 hours seeing the things I wanted to see. Olympic Park is impressive in that the surrounding areas are marshlands which preserve local ecosystems. Just near the stadium, in a pond, I saw that grasses were being started in paper milk cartons, then transferred to the pond to take root and grow. The park’s presence doesn’t disturb the surrounding area hardly at all.

A few points I remember from the tour:
-The two hotels at Olympic Park, the Novetel and the Ibis, are eco-friendly as well. There are roof gardens, where the chef grows vegetables and herbs. The windows are made from recycled glass, and the air conditioning system is programmed to shut off the instant the windows in a room are opened.
-Solar power fuels the lighting outside the stadiums. Each lighting tower commemorates a past Olympic game city (in the case of London and Los Angeles, the two years are written together), and the 1972 Munich Games tower has plaques in English and Hebrew with the names of the Israelis who were killed.
-Olympic Park was constructed from the beginning to not only to meet the requirements of the Olympic Games, but the Paraolympic Games as well.
-ANZ Stadium has seating which can be changed electronically to suit the requirements for cricket, rugby, or Aussie Rules Football.
-The 8 women sculpture commemorates 8 Australian women (7 Olympians and 1 Paraolympian) who have contributed to Olympic success.
-Australia has participated in every Summer Olympics.