Christine Ohuruogu did not have to look far to find her gold medal as she dressed to meet hundreds of thousands of well-wishers in London. It was simply on the kitchen table where she had left it. In fact, the huge gold disc has rarely been far from reach since she returned from Beijing as the Olympic 400 metres champion.

Ohuruogu emerged from her "Olympic bubble", as she put it, to discover that Britain had been captivated by the success of Team GB in China. Hundreds of thousands of people lined the streets of London to show Great Britain's 500 able-bodied and Paralympic athletes just how much their success had cut through the gloom of a nation faltering under the weight of the credit crunch.

For a couple of hours, the capital could forget the woes of rising unemployment and collapsing banks to revel in the appearance of the most successful Great Britain Olympics team in a century. Bankers and stockbrokers hung from the windows of their banks and finance houses and stood in lines ten to 15 deep to watch the parade of Olympic heroes carried on a dozen floats, making a slow procession from the Mansion House, past St Paul's Cathedral and on down Fleet Street and the Strand to Trafalgar Square, where a crowd of 10,000 people were waiting to greet them.

If the athletes had made Britain happy, it was nothing to the surprise felt by the athletes who discovered for the first time just how their achievements had swept through the national psyche and the rapturous welcome provided the inspiration for many of them to look forward to the next Olympic Games, in London in 2012.

Ohuruogu, who lives almost in the shadow of the new Olympic Stadium in East London, said: "The welcome has been really amazing. People have been so nice since we got back but this is the first time we have seen anything like this and it is tremendous.I have not started training yet but this is a fantastic goal to aim for, competing in my home city in 2012."

Tom James, gold medal winner in the rowing men's four, added: "The stock markets must have stopped in London for a couple of hours because so many people in the City came out to see us. They were all waving and having a fantastic time. It was quite overwhelming."

Chris Hoy, the triple gold medal cyclist, was just as taken aback even though he has become the "face" of Team GB in Beijing, as recognisable in the supermarket as he is on television talk shows or speaking at glamorous dinners in front of hundreds of people.

"I have had to get used to the idea of people coming up to me in the street," he said. "But it is great, specially when it is the kids. Seeing all these people coming out to greet us has been quite amazing and humbling. But if this is going to inspire people for 2012, then that is the most important thing, particularly if children start thinking this is something they want to do. Then it has been really worth it.

"Every athlete wants to compete in their home Olympics. It is a once in a lifetime opportunity and we are all even more determined to be there now. This has been a wonderful day that none of us will forget."