Sailing athlete Jo Aleh and track cyclist Aaron Gate proudly held the flag for New Zealand as the team sailed down the Seine during the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympics.
A team of 195 New Zealand athletes are competing across 23 sports at the 2024 Olympic Games.
They'll join more than 10,500 athletes in Paris, 100 years since the French capital last staged the Summer Games. Competition began on Wednesday and the first of the 329 gold medals will be awarded on Saturday. The closing ceremony takes place on August 11.
Gate won bronze at the London 2012 Olympic Games. He will become a four-time Olympian in Paris and is one of New Zealand's most decorated ever Commonwealth Games athletes, with six medals, including the four gold he won at Birmingham 2022.
It's been a rough time for the All Blacks Sevens, who have been kicked out of medal contention in the quarterfinals and the Football Ferns, who lost their opening game to Canada 2-1 in the wake of a drone spy scandal that has affected the Kiwis.
France's three-time Olympic gold medallists Marie-Jose Perec and Teddy Riner then lit the Olympic cauldron, suspended on a hot-air balloon, before Canada's Celine Dion sang Edith Piaf's Hymn to Love, in her first public performance in years, drawing huge cheers from the crowd.
The 56-year-old said in late 2022 that she had been diagnosed with a rare neurological disorder called stiff-person syndrome that causes muscle spasms. Dion, best known for the Titanic movie theme song My Heart Will Go On, has not performed live since March 2020.
A 30-metre (98 ft) high balloon carrying a 7-metre diameter ring of fire took to the air and was hovering dozens of metres above the ground. It will be in the air from sunset until 2am (local time) every day, organisers said.
"We are so proud of this show, I'm so proud that sport and culture were celebrated in such a fantastic manner tonight, it was a first and the result was fantastic despite the rain," Paris 2024 organising president Tony Estanguet told reporters.
A fleet of barges took more than 6000 athletes on a 6km-stretch of the Seine alongside some of the French capital's most famous landmarks, as performers recreated some of the sports to be showcased in the Games on floating platforms. The rain poured down, soaking competitors, VIP guests and some 300,000 spectators.
It was the first time that an opening ceremony has taken place outside a stadium, adding to the headaches for a vast security operation, just hours after a sabotage attack on the high-speed TGV rail network caused travel chaos across France.
"I invite everybody: dream with us. Like the Olympic athletes, be inspired with the joy that only sport can give us. Let us celebrate this Olympic spirit of living in peace," International Olympics Committee President Thomas Bach said as the ceremony came to an end at the foot of the Eiffel Tower.
As the show started four hours earlier, a giant plume of blue, white and red smoke, resembling the French flag, was sent high above a bridge over the Seine as part of a show that included many postcard-like depictions of France, including a huge cancan line performed by Moulin Rouge dancers on the banks.
A more modern image of the country was on display when French-Malian pop star Aya Nakamura, the most-listened to French female singer in the world, sang some of her biggest hits, accompanied by the French Republican Guard's army choir.
Nakamura's performance drew some of the ceremony's biggest cheers. Rumours of her inclusion had sparked a row over French identity, with supporters saying said she represented the vibrancy of modern-day France while her detractors saying her music owes more to foreign influences than French.
Olympics fever had been slow to build in Paris where local residents have complained about street closures in the heart of the city and local businesses have bemoaned a lack of trade as the French capital was transformed into an open-air fortress.
Staff fought a sometimes losing battle to sweep the rainwater off the stage at the Trocadero, where Macron and an array of heads of state and celebrities watched on as the Olympic flag was raised upside down.
SOGGY START
While the celebration of French culture, fashion and history was warmly cheered by many of the thousands of spectators lining the river, hundreds were seen leaving early as the rain fell.
"It was good other than the rain, it was nice, it was different, instead of being in a stadium being on the river, so that's always a good thing - interesting, unique," said Avid Pureval, 34, who came to the Games from Ohio.
"Once you're wet, it’s fine," he said. Still, he was heading back to his hotel after the French boat passed.
"It would have been better with sun," said Josephine, from Paris, sitting beside her 9-year-old daughter and who paid €1600 ($NZ2900) for her seat.
Some 45,000 police and thousands of soldiers have been deployed in a huge security operation in Paris for the ceremony. Armed police patrolled along the river in inflatable boats as the armada made its passage along the Seine.
With many world leaders and VIPs present, the ceremony was protected by snipers on rooftops. The Seine's riverbed has been swept for bombs, and Paris' airspace is closed.
A mix of French and international stars, including football great Zinedine Zidane, 14-times French Open champion Rafa Nadal, 23-times Grand Slam champion Serena Williams and three paralympic athletes were among the last torchbearers before the cauldron was lit. It will blaze until the closing ceremony.
At the start of the parade, applause erupted for the Greek boat - the first delegation, by tradition - and there were even bigger cheers for the boat that followed, carrying the refugees' team. The French, United States and Ukrainian delegations also got loud cheers.
The two most decorated athletes in the Games' history, Michael Phelps and Martin Fourcade, unveiled the gold, silver and bronze medals.
WELCOMED IN TAHITI
Tahiti welcomed the 2024 Olympic surfing event on Friday with blazing sunshine, songs and Polynesian culture honouring the sport's ancient roots, a world away from the rain of the Games' opening ceremony in Paris.
At a beachside park 40km from the surfing venue of Teahupo'o, surfers poured sand from their home beaches into a communal vessel, combining the different colours and textures to symbolise unity and respect for the ocean.
Ceremonial artefacts and some dignitaries arrived in outrigger canoes and were carried up the black sand beach, where athletes paraded into a large tent.
Host nation France naturally received the loudest cheers, especially for local Teahupo'o surfers Vahine Fierro and Kauli Vaast who will be among the favourites when competition kicks of, likely on Saturday.
Athletes and officials danced with local performers wearing grass skirts and flower garlands before big screen TVs crossed live to Paris and a rain-soaked parade of nations.
Back in Tahiti, residents and visitors chatted and strolled around a market set up next door offering fresh vegetables and other local goods.
Tahiti, 16,000km from Paris, is hosting the surfing because it has one of the world's best waves and beaches in France are mostly flat at this time of the year.
ISRAEL DELEGATION
Since the last Games - the Winter Olympics held in Beijing in 2022 - wars have erupted in Ukraine and Gaza, providing a tense international backdrop. France is at its highest level of security, though officials have repeatedly said there is no specific threat to the opening ceremony or the Games.
Israeli competitors are being escorted by elite tactical units to and from events and given 24-hour protection throughout the Olympics due to the war in Gaza, officials say.
The Israel delegation got some boos, but also a lot of cheers, as it sailed by spectators, Reuters reporters saw. Chants of "Palestine! Palestine! Palestine!" rose from the crowd as the boat passed.
Macron, who won a second mandate two years ago, had hoped the Olympics would cement his legacy. But his failed bet on a snap legislative election has weakened him and cast a shadow over his moment on the international stage.
