Take A Bow Canada!

What an Olympics! Our athletes were excellent, Vancouver was exceptional and a party was had by all.

I have never seen so many people wearing their hearts on their sleeves as I saw at these Olympics. I wish I could have been there.

Everybody became Canadian for a short time.

We're guessing it's been a while since you felt so Canadian

How to describe Canada's shocking success at the 2010 Winter Olympics? Here's one way: Canada won more gold medals in Vancouver than the United States and Russia … combined.

Going into these games, Canada had never won a gold medal on home soil. But by the time Sidney Crosby's wrist shot beat Ryan Miller in the overtime of yesterday's glorious men's hockey final, we'd won 14 — more than any other nation in the history of the Winter Olympics. This newspaper would like to add its voice to those congratulating our Olympic athletes for their stunning accomplishment.

What Vancouver did show London was how to stage a Games to be enjoyed by everyone, from athletes to spectators to the general public, who embraced the Olympics with hands uniformly clad in red Olympic mittens.

At times there was a Mardi Gras atmosphere in downtown Vancouver, and this in a place sometimes described by residents themselves as No Fun City.

No amount of planning will guarantee a party like the one Vancouverites enjoyed on Sunday after that heartstopping hockey gold but London will have to show it can get the local population engaged and enthused.

In that sense, Vancouver has set the bar extremely high.

Way to go Vancouver, way to go Canada, take a bow!