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.
Aleh is a two-time Olympic medallist, having won gold at London 2012 and silver at Rio 2016 alongside crew mate Polly Powrie. She has since teamed up with Rio silver medallist Molly Meech, with the pair set to compete in the 49er FX, Team NZ says.
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.
French President Emmanuel Macron declared the Olympic Games open on Friday (local time) after a soaking wet ceremony in which athletes were cheered by the crowd along the Seine, dancers took to the roofs of Paris and Lady Gaga sang a French cabaret song near Notre-Dame cathedral.
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 Canadian 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 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, as 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.
Crowds braved queues at security checks and heavy downpours as they lined the banks of the Seine in Paris to watch an extravagant ceremony that also featured Lady Gaga, the Can-Can and a horse galloping down along the river's waters.
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.
WELCOMED IN TAHITI
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.
At one point, there was a live crossover to the early morning welcome ceremony at the surfing venue, 16,000km away in the Pacific island of Tahiti.
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.
