"1976 Olympics" a Montreal Travel Page by Bwana_Brown

My wife and I had only just arrived in eastern Canada, from Zambia, in 1975 so we were elated to hear that a summer Olympic Games was coming to Montreal - so close that we could not miss it! As an added bonus, a great couple that we knew from our Zambian softball league adventures had also returned as was living in Boucherville, a suburb of Montreal almost next-door to the site of the Games! Thrown into the mix was my wife's brother Steve, who flew over from England when his university courses were completed for the year, and he joined us for the journey up to Montreal for the Games. The July weather was great and so was the whole Olympic experience! Our only regret was that this was a time when the Olympics were used to make political points. It started in 1972 with the Palestinian killing of Israeli athletes in Munich. This was followed in Montreal (1976) with the boycott by most African nations to protest apartheid in South Africa. The 1980 Games in Moscow saw a Western nations boycott due to the invasion of Afghanistan and finally the Soviet bloc boycotted the 1984 Los Angeles games as payback for 1980 ! From our purely personal perspective, we were very sorry that the African nations were not in attendance at Montreal - having only just returned from there, we really wanted to have the chance to cheer them on! The photo shows the scene outside the bike-racing venue at the Velodrome.

Because of cost over-runs due to corruption that are still being paid to this day, the "Big Owe", as it is sometimes called, has become a legend in its own right! As you can see from the photo, time ran out before the main concrete support for the planned retractable roof could be completed - the Games are already underway! Eventually the roof was completed, but it is not retractable - a Kevlar tent-like roof now covers the stadium, suspended on cables from the concrete support above. Nevertheless, it was still a very impressive structure to sit in and watch the Games take place! Luckily, the July weather was so good that there was very little need for a roof anyway!

Despite what people say about the structure, being there inside the Olympic Stadium in 1976 was an experience that I will never forget. It was amazing to me to be in such a large sports arena (having always by geography been a long way from any Professional sports venues in North America)! The atmosphere of the crowd was electric and I can still hear the sweet sounds of the staff working their way through the crowd with cries of 'Biere Froid - Cold Beer" !

Of course, if you have ever tried to buy tickets for Olympic sporting events you will realize that there are two main criteria to be observed - the closer to the finals the event is scheduled, both the price and availability of tickets are affected proportionately! As a result, we got to see a lot of preliminary heats! Even so, the Olympic Experience was something that I have never regretted. And guess what - we were right, it still is the closest Olympics that has been held to where we were living at that point in out lives, even though it was 27 years ago!