Category: General

Back in January I purchased a titanium Beachcomber frame kit on pre-order from my friend Matias after about six months of humming and hawing. So this bike was a fairly long time coming, not unlike the Rambler I just built up – but the timing just happened to nearly overlap and both were built up this month.

I finished running cables on my lunch break this day and got out for its first ride after work. I met up with Mara who brought her titanium Beachcomber as well, and fittingly we met at the skate bowl.

Why so many new bikes when I already have such nice bikes, you may ask. Rest assured I ask myself this question repeatedly, but I believe the logic is sound: The recently built Stooge Rambler is my all-surface adventure bike, built for long rides with a bit of everything as well as camping. This Beachcomber is now my play bike and ATB, built for my Bike Portage Club type rides where there’s everything from road to technical trail, along with hike-a-bike: hence going titanium to minimize weight to carry.

Where do I fit all these bikes, you ask? Rest assured that I’m on a ‘one in, one out’ basis as I’ve long since maxed out my storage capacity, and the Crust Evasion has already moved out to make room for one of these two new bikes. The other one to go, that’s still being debated. I’ll be storing one bike disassembled in the meantime. It’s worth noting that I haven’t ridden the Stooge Scrambler in over nine months now; I just don’t get out to MTB very often anymore.

This was a 27km ride in the end, not too ambitious, but it had a bit of all the things this bike was intended for, including hike-a-bike:

We had come down a steep slope only to hike up the opposing one, but the pay-off was this lovely trail with some pretty impressive hemlocks.

We finished the ride where we started, with a few more loops of the bowl. Here are the two bikes together where the similarities and differences can be seen.

This day I was riding up to Capilano park to meet up with Roberta from the Rivendell google group, afterwards continuing up to the dam. After this I just planned to work my way down the hill without a route in mind, and stumbled upon a bit of a trail along upper McKay creek. It kept going so I kept following it – and was surprised (and happy) to find I could follow it a considerable distance down to the section I was familiar with.

Since I was meeting a Riv-lister, I obviously had to ride the Bombadil:

I brought my Lumix for general photo-taking purposes, but when I heard the familiar and unmistakeable sound of a kingfisher, I had to watch for a bit – it dove several times, catching fish every time I believe. They are one of my favourite birds.

The usual path is obvious below, but to the left is a much more compelling option – and while it was a little bit hike-a-bike, it was really fun.

Coming back over to the Vancouver side, rain was forecasted for the afternoon but never arrived. However, later in the evening some severe thunderstorms rolled in and we got plenty of rain alongside.

I’ve had this Stooge Rambler built up for just about two weeks now, and this ride put me over 300km on it so far – which is to say, it’s almost all I’ve ridden since building. I’m extremely happy with it, meeting my high expectations which have built up for nearly two years now. One of the primary purposes I had in mind for it is bikepacking, which I haven’t done yet (but will in a week!), but I’m fully confident I’ll be very pleased there too.

It started out 26+, but that only lasted a week, not because it was bad but because those rims and tires are earmarked for the Stridsland Beachcomber which arrives next week. It was supremely capable in 26+ mode, but 27.5 x 2.2 has demonstrated how sporty the bike can feel while still capable of sorting out a blue MTB trail.

This Friday evening I wanted to ride a favourite evening loop of mine – out to Dageraad Brewing, 16 km from home, for a beer and burger then over to Burnaby Lake nearby to do some birding at dusk. Specifically I went hoping to see Common Nighthawks, which I did not, but it is always nice to spend time observing nature anyway.

Being Friday evening, the brewery was quite packed. As you can see, the bike rack was rather full too – which is nice to see. After some food and drink I rolled over to the east end of Burnaby Lake, only about 1km away.

I walked about for an hour or so, camera at the ready. I didn’t capture anything particularly notable, though it was a beautiful evening. By the time I left the lake it was dark. It was a 15km or so ride home from here, putting me at around 40 km for the day.

Each summer, Matias of Stridsland bikes and his family return to BC from Denmark to visit with his parents and other family, and it’s become tradition that a big group ride or two is organized during this time. Through mutual friends I’ve become friends with Matias the past couple years, and thus I’ve been able to get out for some smaller group rides with Matias and the crew as well.

When I got the text about going for one last ride before they head back home the next day, I was enthusiastically in, especially because I was afforded the opportunity to incorporate some of the west van route I’d developed for Bike Portage Club. Mara, a decorated route-master herself, wanted to do Millstream trail and perhaps more from her Cookie route. We ended up combining the two, linked together by a short stretch of light trespassing required to get from one to the other.

There were five of us going on the ride, three of whom would be on Beachcombers. I may not (yet) have my own Beachcomber, but I was at least representing 26+: eight of the ten tires on this ride were WTB Ranger 26×2.8’s.

We collected at Matias’ folk’s place and headed off from there. The two non-26+ tires were a pair of Rene Herse knobbies on a custom WZRD single speed, below left. A righteous bike as well!

The first bit of the ride was a challenging road climb to get to the top of the British Properties, where Millstream trail begins. Millstream is one of Mara and I’s favourite local trails – it starts out as a wide and relatively smooth dog-walker type path, gradually becoming more narrow and rough until you’re on pretty technical singletrack punctuated with wash-outs, before culminating in two deep ravine crossings.

But immediately after the second rather brutal ravine crossing, you pop out at the Cypress lookout – going from scrambling in the woods to being surrounded by tourists within minutes. The lookout gives credit to all that climbing done over the past hour:

There is a little-known trail directly below this lookout that we took next, bringing us to lower elevation and connecting to the Caulfield loop’s western section; namely the lookout the route is built around. The sun was low in the sky at this point and the wildfire smoke to the north and west brought a copper hue to the air. Thankfully the air quality where we were wasn’t too bad.

The route has a series of trails that connect really nice, but the trails themselves are often quite challenging or not rideable at all. Some would find this frustrating while others find it joyous; thankfully this group is unanimously in the latter camp. The route seamlessly takes us to a few old growth firs found in the middle of west van, below left. After this, we were back on ‘normal’ roads and headed home.

It’s hard to believe that there’s not a lot more summer left, although with the recent wildfire smoke, I’m quite eager for autumn to arrive. This post summarizes a few outings that didn’t really warrant a standalone post. Mostly bikes, but not always bikes.

The first image, below left, was actually July 31st – a ride with Matias Stridsland and Simon. I took them to this, one of my favourite local spots, which connects (somewhat awkwardly) down to an unmapped trail. Below right was taken August 1st on my way to the grocery store. This good boi has a genetic condition that makes his hair grow long despite being a short-haired breed. What a cutie! Don’t worry, I provided lots of pets.

Below, left: I rode out to Trout Lake to try to spot the green heron(s) residing there, which was unsuccessful, but I had forgotten the farmer’s market would be on this morning and was able to get a chicken adobo sandwich for breakfast. Yum! At right is an old bridge hidden just off Government St at Stoney Creek.

I wanted to check out some areas of Coquitlam for an idea for Burnabop XL day this year, which also gave me opportunity to ride a couple favourite spots along the way.

Fast-forward a week, and I’ve freshly assembled my new Stooge Rambler mostly from parts on the Evasion previously. I wanted to get out for a short shakedown ride before dusk, and chose Trout Lake because it was easy. I totally forgot Bike Rave was happening, and also that it started at Trout Lake, and I ended up showing up just as people were gathering for it.

Heck with it, I joined, despite not having dinner yet. Quite a memorable shakedown ride! Ran into a few friends in the process, too. That was Saturday night. Sunday I got out for a full Seymour valley loop which I’ve posted about already.

Above, right: I finally saw the green heron at Trout Lake after trying probably around ten times – this time it was just cruising the dog park beach, easy as can be to spot!

On Tuesday, I got word wildfire smoke was on the way so I got myself out for a ride despite not feeling too great. It did the trick, by the time I finished I felt a lot better! Just over the bridge and onto some of my fav little trails:

The smoke never got too bad, thankfully, so I was able to participate in Wednesday’s parkbagging as well as Thursday’s Hotdogz group ride. In the first six days of having the Rambler built up, I’ve ridden it 170 km!

Since spring of 2025 I’ve been convinced that the Stooge Rambler would be my ideal adventure bike, suited perfectly for the sort of mixed terrain all-day ambles I like to ride on any given weekend as well as weekend trips to the Gulf Islands and some bigger bikepacking routes I have ambition to ride. It’s been sold out until now, so I’m finally realizing this dream almost a year and a half later.

I received the frame on Friday afternoon and started building it up straight away. Saturday morning I made a trip to the local bike shop to get the last bits I needed, then took it for a ride in the evening – joining up with Bike Rave with hundreds of illuminated bikes taking over the street. Quite a shake-down ride! On Sunday I took it up Seymour valley on my favourite loop, making sure to stop at all my favourite spots.

I don’t homebrew anymore, but I always make a point to attend the annual summer BBQ put on in one of the founding members’ backyard. In addition to seeing a lot of old friends, the quality of food and beer is better than most restaurants in Vancouver. The main course is pulled pork, which is smoked overnight prior to being prepped immediately before the event.

It starts at 4pm, so in keeping with tradition, I went for a loop around Pacific Spirit park first. Riding through Jericho, some country music festival was going on, so I pressed on to get away from the noise. I could still hear it when I reached the UBC grounds, several kilometres later. While it was busy around there, by the time I was at the west end of Spanish Banks, it was very quiet:

I took my favourite route from the northwest corner to the southeast corner, passing through several different biospheres. While there’s no old growth in Pac Spirit, it does contain some of the oldest second-growth in greater Vancouver.

I arrived at the BBQ around 5pm as intended, and it was already pretty packed. Food was predictably excellent, and I went for a second helping (not pictured). The beers were great, as well as some great ciders from friend LA and vermouth from another friend dave. There were excellent meads going around too, but I mostly steered clear to keep myself out of trouble. It worked!

Despite getting home after 11:30pm, and having who-knows-really-how-much beer, I felt quite good the following morning – and the weather was cool and properly wet. The pups love this weather (and, to be honest, so do I) so we got out for a two hour walk including a stopover at Burrard view:

Matias, owner of Stridsland, lives and operates out of Denmark but grew up in North Vancouver and visits in the summer. He’s started organizing a big group ride when in town, and this past Saturday was the 2026 edition – combining forces with Boneshaker MTB and pals Hotdogs on Wheelz. I also rode with him and the other organizers, along with a small group, on Thursday evening. These snaps are from Thursday:

Now onto Saturday. This first photo was taken on the morning dog walk actually, but I quite like it so I’m including anyway. The ride was predictably well-attended, and a lot of fun. I got a lot of wheelie practice in, and have been steadily improving – and the hype from the ride (and a couple beers) helped me take my chances with some higher speed shenanigans.

I joined a FB group for Vancouver area birding, and recently have been noticing that some cool birds I haven’t seen before were being regularly spotted at ƛ̓éxətəm (previously Colony Farm) in Port Coquitlam, so today’s goal was to ride out there with my new Lumix ZS300 and get some bird photos. Being just a point-and-shoot camera with 1″ sensor, the photos aren’t ever going to be that impressive, but good enough for ID for sure.

I’ll put the bird photos and bird talk at the end, and talk about the ride first. I just received this cross-body strap from Nocs the day before, which really unlocks the ability to ride with the camera and get photos on-the-fly. It worked great.

The loop tallied to 72km, with my birding destination about 30km from home. A lot of it was along paved parkway or bike route, and included sections of trail to connect things up.

Here’s a photo from the camera in the clearing after a section of trail, approaching my destination in the distance.

Fast-forward to when I’ve left the area (I spent close to 2 hrs there) and climbed up to Mundy Park; a brutal hill to get up there, but I figured it was more interesting than just going back the way I came. This cute little pollinator garden was a bonus:

A couple photos from Mundy below. There are two small lakes in the park, and I was also surprised by the bird activity which turned it into a second wave of birding I wasn’t really expecting.

Onto the birds! So, my inspiration for riding out to ƛ̓éxətəm park in PoCo was from recent sightings of Eastern Kingbirds and Lazuli Buntings. The latter are a very exotic blue colour, while the Kingbirds aren’t too exciting but a new bird is a new bird! I didn’t see any Lazuli buntings, but I did get three new birds.

Well before I arrived here though, I heard brown creepers along the Brunette River on the bike path. I’ve come to recognize their sound, which reminds me of trees rubbing against each other in the wind, except higher pitched. I think most people who walk the woods around here would be familiar with their call, even though most won’t have seen them since they’re pretty well camouflaged. I took quite a few unsuccessful photos before I managed this banger of a pair of what I believe to be juveniles:

Once in Colony Farm proper, I walked a 600m long no-bikes path and found this bare shrub tree that provided a rotation of birds to view to reward my patience. Among others, I saw a beautiful American Goldfinch, and to my great excitement, I finally got a proper view (and photo) of a common yellowthroat!

About 40 yards away was this Eastern Kingbird chilling. It would fly a loop and land back on the same perch, affording me enough time to get a decent photo. This was at maximum zoom for the camera including digital zoom (30x), so while the photo isn’t super detailed, I’m very pleased to be able to get a photo at all from such distance.

An unexpected new bird for me was the northern rough-legged swallow, of which I saw many – three pictured here, with the parents nearby.

Moving onto Mundy Park, I noticed a lot of birdsong when I got into the woods so I pulled out the ol’ Merlin app to see what was around me. It quickly picked up red-eyed vireo, brown creeper, western tanager, and chestnut-backed chickadee. I have only seen western tanager once before and they are very exotic looking birds so I was keen to get a photo if possible, and I’d never seen a red-eyed vireo so that was motivational as well. Sadly I didn’t see either, but I did get to watch this cedar waxwing which Merlin never picked up:

I also got a fleeting look at a western flycatcher but no photo. After this, I rolled westward to Dageraad for a burger and beer before making my way back into town. I left the house at 11:30am and returned just before 7pm – a good full day out!

My only plan today was to check out the Shim’s Ride crit race happening about 5km from home, but I left the house almost five hours before the races I wanted to see without much of a plan. I did have my new camera with me, a Panasonic Lumix ZS300, which replaced the ZS99 I owned for 13 days but decided the image quality was just too poor. The 300 has only half the zoom, but a much larger sensor. It also cost about 60% more, so I hope I get my money’s worth out of it.

Having this camera with me, I figured Iona would be a good destination; it’s about 28km each way, and is a local hotspot for birds as I’ve covered before. I decided to ride out to the far end of the northern spit, which is mostly hardpack but does get sandy in spots:

The tide was really low, and the sandy beach extended as far as I could see – and was firm enough I was able to ride around on it for a while! Pretty fun but also pretty tiring – and pretty hard on my drivetrain, I imagine.

As for the photos I got with the new camera, the birdwatching wasn’t too exciting but here are some images off the camera. I’m pretty happy with them considering it’s a 15x zoom point-and-shoot.