It's official - the Vancouver 2010 Olympic torch relay will start right here in Victoria.

The worst-kept secret in town was confirmed by Olympic organizers Friday morning in Vancouver and then celebrated by local politicians and Olympic athletes at the Crystal Garden.

"Forty-five thousand kilometres, over 1,000 cities, 200 celebration cities, over 100 days but only one starting point," said Victoria Mayor Alan Lowe.

The Olympic flame will be lit by the sun in Athens, Greece, loaded onto a plane and will fly straight into the Inner Harbour Oct. 30 2009, where it will spend 24 hours in the Capital Region before starting a 107-day journey around the country before returning to Vancouver, Lowe announced.

He painted a word picture of the scene that day, centered around a multi-cultural celebration with dancers, banners and a flotilla filling the Inner Harbour.

"At dusk, we light up the sky with fire spinners, fireworks and the lights of thousand of handheld torchieres as over 50,000 people converge to celebrate," he said.

The global attention couldn't come at a better time for the tourism industry, he noted.

Victoria's Dave Calder, a Beijing silver medalist in mens rowing, recalled being inspired by the Calgary 1988 Olympic torch relay as a 10-year-old.

"Don't underestimate the power of the Olympics and don't underestimate power of the torch relay," he said.

Watching the torch relay helped him make sense of what it means to live in Canada, he said.

After the Calgary games were done, a visit to his school from a medal-winning skier sparked his own Olympic drive.

"That was the day I started to believe in dreams, I started to believe that anything was possible and that's where the dots started to connect."

From Victoria, the flame will travel north where it will traverse the territories before reaching the Atlantic Ocean in Newfoundland. It then starts the westward journey back across the country before it's arrival back in Vancouver for the Feb. 12 2010 opening ceremony.

Now the search begins for torchbearers to carry the flame along its route. The process is open to all, and information on applying is available online at www.vancouver2010.com.

kvass@vicnews.com