The Gardeners' World Blog

Well, the countdown has begun. It's just under four weeks to the start of the Olympics and the advance party of the BBC's production team (that's Rebekah Kipps, Olympic Project Executive and myself, Executive Producer) has arrived in Beijing.

To be fair, there have been a number of sub-contracted technicians here for a month already fitting out the BBC's area in the International Broadcast Centre (IBC).

We have had to travel to Beijing 11 days earlier than intended, thanks to an unscheduled World Broadcaster briefing which has been called because of serious issues with the local organisation.