Grand Slam Plan Progress Update: 75% Complete

Australian Open, French Open and Wimbledon complete. US Open to go!

Grand Slam Tournaments attended to date in 2012: 3 (Australian Open, French Open, Wimbledon)
Sessions of grass court tennis attended live in June 2012 : 7 (1 x AEGON Championships, 2 x AEGON Classic, 4 x Wimbledon)
Highlights
- AEGON Championships Practice Sessions : The weekend before Queens starts you can enter for free on both the Saturday and Sunday. You can see qualifying matches and top players practicing. We saw Tsonga, Murray, Roddick, Baghdatis, Hewitt and loads of others
- Wimbledon Practice Courts : As with Queens you can see loads of players walking to and from the practice courts and practicing. We saw Nadal, Djokovic, Kvitova, Del Potro, Wozniaki, Baghdatis, Verdasco and other players.
- Getting returned tickets for Centre Court on Day 1 was a fantastic start to Wimbledon
- It was great to be at Sam Stosur’s first round match, which she won against Carla Suarrez-Navarro
Number of times rained on while in the UK : Countless
Number of sunny days without rain during 8 weeks spent in Paris and the UK : Approximately 15, half during one week in Paris, the others were spread intermittently throughout 6 weeks in the UK
Best investment for the trip : An excellent rain count
New skills learned : Being good with rain
Items of Merchandise purchased: 1 x Rafa T-Shirt, 1 x Queens keyring, 1 x Ralph Lauren Wimbledon hoodie, 1 x Wimbledon pot holder (the strawberries drew me in!), various items to be given to others as gifts

The Championships at Wimbledon is the hardest grand slam tournament to get tickets for, but it is worth it
The Centre Court roof is not necessary closed just because it is raining, or because rain is forecast
Getting seats on Court 3 is a lovely experience; it’s small which means that you’re close to the players, excellent matches are scheduled there and the seats are cushion-y and comfy
It’s not easy to charge your phone at Wimbledon, I’ve been advised of one power point located deep within Court 1 but didn’t see any others
The crowd at Wimbledon is generally really good natured, despite the weather and despite the fact that a lot of people have been up since before dawn to get to the queue.

Wimbledon is class all the way.

It’s really easy and affordable to get a pre paid sim card in the UK. We walked in to a mobile phone shop, paid 15 pounds and got a 30 day sim card with unlimited data, 3000 minutes of calls and 3000 texts.

the UK friends and family who we stayed with for their incredible hospitality
the UK friends and family that we spent time with
everyone who read this blog
the Twitter friends that I met in person
tennis friends on Twitter and Facebook for the laughs, advice, entertainment, updates and feedback
and as always, to @Ballboy2012 for incredible support in making this trip happen. For taking amazing photos, making the coffees, carrying the bags, figuring out logistics, fitting all our luggage in the cases and being really fast at buying tickets online from Ticketmaster.

We’re now heading back to Melbourne for about five weeks before heading to the US for the US Open.

Until next time

Grand Slam Gal