Ride Organizer:
Dug Andrusiek

Start/Finish: North Vancouver - Lonsdale Quay

Note from Organizer Dug: The LM Summer 200 named the Vancouver Safari is shaping up. This route has lineage dating back to one of the earliest permanent routes #30 "Tour de Greater Vancouver." The thing I like about this permanent is the that it includes many of Vancouver's excellent bike paths and routes. And what I like about Vancouver's bike paths and bike routes is that they travel through some nice neighborhoods.

With that in mind, Vancouver Safari is an effort to exploit Vancouver's beauty, bike routes and ...civic infrastructure. You got it...this route manages to pass by 3 of Greater Vancouver's sewage treatment plants, travel through a major freshwater watershed, and traverse through a garbage dump. One of the earlier names for the route was "Vancouver Safari: your tax dollars at work", but that seemed too cynical.

So, why mention the civic infrastructure? Well, simply, I am fascinated by what it takes to make a major metropolitan area work. I also love natural and industrial landscape, and history. This route is an effort to expose the rider to areas we pass by every day, but more slowly and deliberately. Peak out into the Salish Sea while you travel the last
stretch of Marine Drive into Whytecliffe Park. Ponder the life of Finnish settlers who called Woodward Slough their home in the 1890s. Experience the transformation of North Delta along River Rd towards the Pattullo Bridge, followed by a languid traverse of Queens Park in New Westminster.

From the Fraser River the travel through Maillardville, another late 19th century settlement, this time settled by French Canadian mill workers. The climb through Coquitlam will seem less long than the descent into Port Moody, the original terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway. Peak into Burrard inlet, a name that stuck once christened by George Vancouver in 1792. Burrard, who became an admiral, was a shipmate with Vancouver prior to Vancouver's epic exploration of the west coast in the 1790s.

The final control is mix of Vancouver history and Greater Vancouver infrastructure.

I hope you look forward to this exploration of Greater Vancouver.

Route Sheet
[Excel]