“When you carry the torch you are the only person in the world carrying the Olympic flame,” an official reminded me as I got on the bus with 10 other torchbearers in the Devonshire town of Okehampton this morning.
And the people of Devon were today in no doubt about that.
As we passed through villages at 7.30am to drop everyone at their starting points there were already hundreds gathered taking pictures and cheering.
There is excitement among my fellow torchbearers with some nervous talk and laughter — mainly discussing torch-carrying style (one hand or two?). Others sat quietly, preparing for their moment with the flame.
But when the first torchbearer from our group gets out to run his leg we are all stunned and slightly daunted by the reaction he gets — screams and shouts that made us all feel like celebrities.
My nerves build until we reach my stop, number 017, in the village of Hatherleigh, and I am left on my own waiting for the flame to arrive. I am amazed by the interest the torch receives and bombarded by people asking to have their picture taken with the torch, some thrusting their children at me.
Finally the car carrying the “mother flame” arrives, a friendly man asks me for my name and I’m away — carrying what suddenly feels like the most important thing in the world.
Adrenaline surges through my body and there are suddenly thousands of people cheering. I get so lost in it that someone has to tell me to slow down because I hadn’t noticed that the media truck in front of me had stopped.
Every moment seems to go in slow motion but, like a bungee jump or a car crash, it is over in what feels like seconds and suddenly I am passing the flame to the next torchbearer — Mark Edwards, 20, from Ilchester in Somerset — and my moment with the flame has fizzled out.
But the overriding feeling I will remember from today is the enthusiasm, warmth and sheer excitement of spectators.
Judging by today’s excitement, people here are elated about the torch and the London Games with an unsubtle American-style excitement that would normally be classed as “un-British”.
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If the flame is met with this kind of reaction in the rest of the UK, the Games are set to be unlike anything anyone has ever seen.
To find out more about the Olympic Torch Relay visit www.lloydstsb.com/olympictorchrelay
