It's a crazy city and I was quite relieved to leave relatively unscathed, with merely a collection of Russian words and a deep appreciation for vodka!

Since then, it's been pretty hectic with a trip over the pond to Massachusetts for the world's biggest regatta, the Head of the Charles.

A group of fellow internationals got together and organised an eight, so Anna Bebington (now Watkins after her recent wedding) and myself ended up joining forces with two Dutch girls, three Yanks, a Kiwi and a Canadian to take the title in Championships Women's Eights event.

It was a fantastic event and a very memorable experience. That is one of the best things about sport - being able to keep the competition and the hate out on the water, and occasionally come together to just enjoy racing and celebrate rowing.

I will attempt to blog a bit more regularly from now on, but in my first one back I don't have anything earth-shattering to report so I thought I'd talk a bit about the books that have kept me going through training and racing.

Annabel Vernon (fourth from right) and Anna Watkins (behind her) take part in the Head of the Charles

I'm working my way through the Russian classics at the moment after experiencing St Petersburg but, for a bit of light relief, a friend lent me the climber Chris Bonington's autobiography, which is fantastic.

As a sportswoman myself, it's always fascinating to learn about other sports, to try to understand where the thrill lies, where the challenges are, and what creates the highs and lows. The best part of this book is that Bonington is very descriptive of why he climbs - the balance between the skill of physically climbing the rock, and the danger aspect of hanging on by his fingernails over a drop of three thousand feet in the Alps.

It made me think a bit more about the books that you see athletes reading on the bus on the way to regattas, or lying on the bed between training sessions, or at the back of the boathouse hours before a big race.

The classic athletes' text would be The Old Man and the Sea, Ernest Hemingway's short story about a fisherman who catches a giant marlin, only for it to be virtually devoured by sharks before he gets it back to shore.

As I interpreted it, the moral is therefore that all achievements are transitory, and you should never base your whole life upon one thing because it could be you'll have nothing physical to show for it. The struggle is where the nobility lies.

Apart from this one, a lot of athletes will read sporting biographies. I suppose this is partly as a learning tool - learning how others have stayed motivated, improved, driven themselves and coped with highs and lows. However, in my experience sporting biographies are little more than a glorified list of achievements.

One of the best ones I've read would be Martin Cross's book, Olympic Obsession. I may be biased as I know Martin (the Guardian's rowing correspondent and BBC Radio 5 live reporter) well, but as a sports book it's fascinatingly detailed on the all the behind-the-scenes gossip and politics of Olympic sport, as well as the 'dark side' of the experience with an honest account of his own struggle with depression. This is a must-read for all aspiring Olympians - rowers and non-rowers.

When we go away on training camp, I choose books that are escapist. I don't want to be doing sport and reading about it as well. One of my best choices was War and Peace - it was a good friend through the long, dark days of the winter of 2008, and it meant that I could return from hard hours in the gym or on the river and utterly lose myself in stories of Russian court society, or the battlefields of the Napoleonic wars.

In Beijing I ended up in the reverse situation - with a book so bad it just made me angry. It was a historical biography but was so badly researched, analysed and written that it served an excellent purpose of taking my mind off my Olympic regatta by giving me book rage instead!

I'd be interested to know what you think of sports writing. I don't just mean biographies, but also abstracts such as Simon Barnes' The Meaning of Sport or Steve Redgrave's You can Win at Life.

Are they read by people desperately searching for an insight or a shortcut that simply isn't there? I guess what I'm driving at is the question of whether sport is as interesting to read about as many people make out. Isn't the thrill all in the experiencing and doing?

It's 48 hours since my World Championship final, where Anna Bebington and I won a silver medal behind the Polish double, and the medal is now looking somewhat scratched, I'm somewhat hungover and racing seems like something that happens to someone else.

It's still taking some time to sink in what this silver medal means to us - the culmination of a season's blood, sweat and tears.

Of course, we would have loved to have won the final but we were beaten by a faster crew; yet again I come up against the home favourites, which seems to be my curse!

It was the Germans in 2007 when the World Championships were in Munich, the Chinese in 2008 when we were in Beijing, and the Poles this year.

We truly gave it our all but I think we probably gave too much away in the first quarter so we were always chasing it.

We started moving through the field in the third 500m, and with 750m left Anna called for a big effort to win the race.

We truly gave it our all but the Poles just found that extra gear to hold us off, and the last 250m was a bit of a blur - I had absolutely rowed to my maximum and there was nothing left in the tank.

We were over the moon with our race and with our result and this season has been so much fun. Anna and I have grown very close but she's shortly leaving me to get married, which will be tough!

I'm now off on my holidays, starting in Istanbul and finishing in Moscow, so I'll try to write more when I'm back in civilization.

Watch Bebington and Vernon talk about their event before and after the race in Poland (UK users only)

I tried to write a reply, but it turned into such a long post I thought it'd be easier to simply include it in a new entry.

So what do the Olympics mean to us? It's hard to know where to begin.

Our sport is totally organised into four-year cycles. Training principles, rowing technique, funding, organisation, coaches, priority boats, training camps, equipment and so many day-to-day necessities are reassessed and sorted out after the Olympics for the next cycle.

Athletes also define their lives by four-yearly cycles, and you know that everyone peaks at the Olympics. In other years, people are at different stages in their development but for the Olympics, for that fortnight every four years, every single elite athlete irrespective of sport is aiming to be at their best.

Everything that happens in the four years between Games is a stepping stones but after the Games there are no more steps to take: that particular journey will be over and a new one will begin.

There is no "next year"; after each Games, the slate is wiped clean. Steve Redgrave often said that he would gladly exchange all his World Championships medals for the Olympic one at the end of every four years, and this is what it boils down to - the Olympics is everything. Nothing else comes close.

So as nick2012 asks, why are the Olympics such a big deal compared to the World Championships?

In the rowing world, the World Championships is an annual regatta. Winning it (as I have done, in 2007) means you're the best in the world on that day, and that can call yourself a world champion.

It gives you a deep pride that you're the best in the world at what you do. The Olympics, however, go beyond sport, and therefore mean more.

Whereas the World Championships is a regatta; the Olympic Games are an epoch-defining event that touches the lives of everyone who competes, whether they come first, second or last.

I think it's because the Olympics are such a strange event - a bizarre cocktail of imperialism, politics, commercialism, culture, people and cities, with sport as its excuse.

So no, I don't think that the Olympics are over-hyped; which brings me on to the question of whether the achievement pales as the hype wears off.

I think we should be clear on one point: the Olympics is, in sporting terms, the most prestigious event to win, and athletes want to win the best events, not because of how the public views it but because they want to be the best.

Athletes aren't doing a job, or seeing out time, or making a career choice. We are here with the single purpose and driving need to win Olympic gold.

That is it: the single reason for the entire structure of British rowing to exist, and the single reason for me to get out of bed every day and get in my sculling boat.

We're not doing this because it's going to look good on our CVs, or because there are good pension rights, or there are opportunities for flexi-time (there aren't).

We're here because every one of us has decided at some point in our lives that we have a burning desire to see how good we can be at our sport. If you want a bunch of balanced, normal, stable people, then don't try the British Olympic team.

It's important to remember that other people view our careers, our achievements, our medals and our results very differently to how we do. Even the people closest to me, my friends and family, still don't quite appreciate how I relate to what happened to me in Beijing.

Of course, when I went to the Olympics I felt like I had the hopes of the country on my shoulders. There was an incredible feeling of will - so many people at home willing us to do well out in China.

But the reason I wanted to win that race was nothing to do with the mass public in Britain, or the rowing supporters in the grandstands, or even my friends and family, coaches and support staff.

I desperately wanted to win that race for myself. And I'd desperately wanted to win that race for myself for years and years before I had even been selected for the Olympic team, and probably long before I ever took up rowing.

Yes, there is a great degree of popular interest in the great sporting events that occur every few years, but the athletes at the coal face will be utterly selfish, arrogant and driven in their motives.

Once the "hype" has died down, will there be a feeling of emptiness? No. There will remain a deep, deep satisfaction that you reached the summit of sport.

And as for the Olympics being the defining moment of our lives, perhaps I phrased that wrongly. To the outside world, the Games are the reckoning of us as athletes.

Our success is judged by the number of Olympic medals we've won, and quite rightly so. But to us as people, of course there's more to life than sport. Anyone who knows me knows that rowing comes far down my list of priorities, behind family and friends, health and happiness.

Of course in 20 years time, when I look back at my rowing career, my Olympic regatta will be just one of many memories that I have.

If I'm asked to name the most memorable times in my sport, or the achievements of which I'm most proud, or the best times, or the worst times, the Olympic regatta will just rank as one fortnight amongst many that I've been a full-time professional athlete.

As people we don't pin our entire self-worth on the result of that fortnight; but as athletes we are here to perform and it's how we do at the Olympics which decides how successful we are.

I hope that's answered some questions. It's a tricky subject, because you'll find that every athlete is motivated slightly differently and reacts differently to success and failure.

Another member of the team would, I'm sure, give a different response to your post than what I've said. I can only give my point of view. Of course there's much more to life than an Olympic gold, but it's one of many paths to take through life and once you're on that path, the quest becomes all-consuming.

Annabel and her crew-mate this year, Anna Bebington, are next in action at the World Championships in Poznan, Poland from 23-30 August. Watch the finals live on BBC TV.

Firstly, I'm discovering the value of experience. It's a term that is often bandied around in conversations about sport, but what does it actually mean? It's more than simply having done your time.

It's the years and years of confidence ingrained from results, medals, and close verdicts. It's knowing how the system works and how to win races. It's making the right decisions in the split seconds during which races can be decided.

Quite frankly, it's knowing what to do in any situation that is thrown at you.

In order to see this content you need to have both Javascript enabled and Flash installed. Visit BBC Webwise for full instructions. If you're reading via RSS, you'll need to visit the blog to access this content.

Having said that, though, I always try to balance the wisdom of six years' service in international rowing, with the freshness of a novice.

I often find myself thinking back to my first year on the team in 2005, and asking myself what the 2005 version of Annabel would have done.

There is a saying: "If you do what you've always done, you'll get what you've always got" and I think you need to balance your experience of what's gone before with the aim to always look at your rowing objectively and with a clear head.

Getting through the training programme and relying on past results won't win races -excitement, vitality and new ideas set you apart from the rest.

A second fact about this year which has swiftly become apparent to me is that it is very different to 12 months ago!

This was clear when standing on the podium in Banyoles and again in Munich, where something like three journalists wished to hear our opinions and maybe five photographers took our pictures.

I cast my mind back to the sweltering heat of the Olympic podium, where probably 50 flashbulbs were going off during the medal ceremony, and there was a walkway several hundred metres long with journalists and reporters both sides, desperate to record our every thought for posterity.

Last year, every World Cup race was dissected on television as a possible pointer in the road to the Olympics. This year, we've been bumped off television by Jenson Button and Co, who apparently are more of a crowd-puller than us rowers.

And it's not only media interest that makes '09 so different to '08. This time last year, we were watching the Wimbledon finals over the internet, on yet another training camp on the Rhine canal, having already spent four months of the previous nine abroad.

I hadn't had a night out since Christmas Eve and I hadn't even stayed up to welcome in the New Year - I had an early night, to make sure my training sessions on New Year's Day were top quality.

One of my friends has a photo of me from a wedding we'd been to in June last year, and it's known as my 'sober and stressed' photo.

I look drawn, worried, and knackered and I remember leaving the wedding by 10pm having drunk orange juice all night, to be sure I could still get an early night.

By contrast, 2009 has seen us enjoying Wimbledon hospitality and socialising at Henley Royal Regatta, still giving our training 100% - but not spending our non-rowing time thinking about training as well.

Overall 2009 has, so far, been much more enjoyable. Of course the Olympics are the defining feature of our lives, and our entire sporting careers will be judged on our performances at this four-yearly event.

But the other years carry the same highs and lows, successes and failures, and rollercoasters of emotions; this year is lived much less in the public eye but it's no less challenging for it!

Watch Annabel in action at the third World Cup regatta in Lucerne, live on the red button and BBC Sport website on Sunday, with highlights on BBC Two on Monday, 1300-1400 BST.

It's been nine months since I stood on the Olympic podium in the haze and humidity of Beijing having a silver medal hung around my neck, yet it seems like a lifetime ago.

The Olympics was an absolutely incredible experience on so many levels, but at the same time it wrings dry every part of your heart, body and soul, and I reached the point where I wanted to get back to just being me.

Straight after the Games, I took a long trip to Mongolia and I think it was absolutely the best place for me to gather my thoughts again and remind myself of who I was. I don't know if you've been to Mongolia but there's not much there except space, and it was space that I needed.

After a long time thinking about Beijing 2008 and looking to London 2012, I decided that I hadn't quite finished with the lure of international sport, and I wanted to give it another shot.

This brings me up to where I found myself last weekend - back in a boat, sitting on a start line of an international regatta, in that moment of utter stillness before the starting buzzer sounds.

This was the first World Cup regatta in Banyoles, northern Spain, the Olympic regatta venue for Barcelona '92. We have three of these World Cups, which are points-accumulating and have less significance, before the big one, the World Championships in Poland in late August.

And even the World Championships is less important on its own as it forms a marker on the road to London 2012.

This World Cup provided more than the usual set of challenges, however, as four of us competed in two different events: the double scull and the quad scull.

Unlike swimming or cycling, where competitors routinely compete in several events, in rowing the technical demands of building a crew boat together with the physical demands of rowing a 2000m race flat out means that doubling up is comparatively rare. Steve Redgrave tried it at Seoul in '88 and 'only' managed a gold and a bronze.

The double scull found me back in my 2006 combination, with Anna Bebington, in which we finished a respectable fourth at that year's World Championships.

She's spent the last four years in this boat, winning a world bronze and Olympic bronze, so is incredibly confident and experienced in the double.

Having spent the past two seasons in the quad myself, it's been quite a learning process coming back to the small boat, where the races are longer and more tactical.

In Banyoles, we managed to win the double with a controlled race, and followed that with a victory in the quad.

It was a great regatta and - after the pressure, razzmatazz and huge media interest in Beijing - it was great to be able to get out there and race hard without all the song and dance surrounding it.

Of course, in London in three years' time, no-one's going to remember who did what at the first World Cup of this Olympiad. But at the same time, it's the old saying: If not me, then who?

We go out to win every race and we think we should be the fastest double out there. Battle re-commences in two weeks in Munich at the second World Cup and the competition will get tougher with our main rivals expected to be Bulgaria and Germany. Watch this space...