I didn't really know that I was going to buy tickets to the 2024 Summer Olympics until they were bought and paid for, the somewhat extravagant amounts of money disappearing from my bank account with one click.
You see, I won the initial online lottery to purchase tickets to the Paris Games – and I got carried away in the excitement of the moment. Of course, I would learn later that almost everyone who enters "wins" the lottery and that it works more like a queueing system for ticket purchases than an actual lottery with winners and losers. Still, I was giddy. I was going to the Olympics!
Do I have plans for a hotel? No. Do I have flights? No. Did I really think through how I was going to get between the track and field events near Paris and the sailing events in the south of France, near Marseille, that I was now officially attending, according to my already-empty wallet? Not really. But I'm going!
Some dream of winning Olympic medals. I dream of cheering along those who do. And have I thought much about how I'm going to finance my personal Olympic (spectator) dream, given sky-high Parisian prices around the games? Well, maybe I'll win the lottery. In the meantime, I'll be using Lonely Planet's tips to planning a trip to the 2024 Olympics.
— Laura Motta, Senior Director of Content
