Weather fails to rain on Australia’s parade as flotilla officially opens Paris Olympics | Jack Snape

Jess Fox and Eddie Ockenden were among those who got soaked as they sailed down the Seine but their grins were visible from the river’s banks

“I woke up this morning and it was raining,” Australia’s flag bearer Jess Fox said in Paris on Friday, as she prepared to lead her national team on a barge along the Seine in the grand opening to the Olympics. “But it won’t rain on our parade.”

The line was obviously rehearsed, one final practice session for Fox ahead of the formal start of Olympic competition on Saturday. But seeing the soaked smiles of the Australians as they sailed down Paris’ magnificent central artery, flanked on both sides by hundreds of thousands of Parisians, it was hard to disagree.