The torch of the Paris Olympic Games began its journey to France this Saturday aboard the “Belem” sailboat that set sail from the Greek port of Piraeus, after the flame spent the night at the French embassy in Athens. Less than one hundred days before the inauguration ceremony, the historic French sailing ship began an unprecedented journey, as it is the first time that the Olympic flame, which was lit every four years in ancient Olympia, is transported by sea from Greece to the host nation of the Games.
The 19th century sailing ship is scheduled to dock on May 8 in the port of Marseille, where the journey of the Olympic flame will begin through various parts of France, including its overseas territories, until the opening of the Games in Paris, on May 26. July. The sailboat, the last three-masted ship in the French merchant navy and designated a ‘historical monument’ in 1984, was escorted by the trireme “Olympias” of the Greek navy and 25 other vessels before dozens of people stationed behind a security barrier. in the port.
«It is an exceptional feeling. “It is a great emotion for me,” Tony Estanguet, president – not without controversy – of the Organizing Committee of the Paris Games, told reporters before the ship set sail. Estanguet highlighted the great “coincidence” that a sailboat like the “Belem”, which is part of the French historical heritage, was launched into the sea for the first time a few weeks after Athens held the first modern Olympic Games in 1896.
«We came here so that the children understand that the Olympic ideal was born in Greece. “I feel very excited,” Giorgos Kontopoulos, who witnessed the beginning of the sailboat’s journey with his two children, told AFP.
#Olympic #flame #leaves #France #Diario #Página