After putting together monthly recap posts at the end of 2025, I realized this could be a good way to post up random photos or moments from the month that don’t warrant their own post, so figured I would try to keep that habit going. January felt pretty quiet, so I had only made two posts (both in the last week of the month), but now that I’ve combed through my photos I’ve realized this will end up being pretty long!
The month started, of course, with New Years Day. I had an imperial stout the night before after a couple ‘regular’ beers and was not feeling 100%, but got out for about 25 km of noodling around East Vancouver on the Evasion.
On the 2nd, I had a plan to ride out to see the new and old bridges between New Westminster and Surrey; the old Patullo bridge would be coming down soon (I wish it was being saved as a pedestrian / cycling bridge!) and its replacement, the Stalewasem, is partially open now. It’s about 25 km each way to get to it, and I enlisted my friend Rob.
A couple days later, just before it was time to go back to work, I got out for another Burnaby Mountain loop. I followed the small trail under the powerlines up the west side of the mountain, then looped around clockwise on the Trans-Canada trail – a beautiful stretch of trail that can get a bit busy with walkers. I hadn’t ridden this in about two years, as I’m usually on the lower Barnet trail.
I took the Evasion on the blue-rated MTB trails around the mountain and it was a lot of fun – the plus-sized Rangers are plenty grippy if you’re not pushing too hard, and the dropper of course is a must-have.
On the 8th of January we received a dusting of snow, which remains the only snow we’ve gotten so far this winter. Sunny was stoked, Leia enjoyed it much more stoically.
‘Tis the season for taking advantage of every small opportunity to ride, such as the ~10km loop on the Twenty which generated the image below. The snow had receded up the mountains but it was still pretty cold.
I ended up riding the following night as well, this time to pick up a new coffee setup downtown. I watched the clouds as a low pressure and high pressure ridge collided, creating quite the visual.
On the 11th, which was a Sunday, I took a chance with a small break in the rain – the rain held off long enough for me to get up to the viewpoint shown below, but I got rained on the ~5km ride home. Love the poncho though, underneath I was quite dry! It works with the front bag to offer extra leg coverage.
The rain continued on, with temperatures just high enough to keep things wet. This is the reality of Vancouver winters, but I still feel really lucky we have this instead of snow and frigid temps.
I commuted home mid-day during the following week and took the opportunity to ride past three funky houses that are loosely along the longer route I can readily take.
On the 17th, a Friday, I left home for the downtown waterfront to meet up with Rob for a cold one in the cold air. The days are inching longer, not entirely dark when I get off work at 5pm now, but the light was all but gone by the time I made it into town. We rode into Stanley Park and followed some gravel paths before working eastwards towards my neighbourhood.
Saturday was errands day, and we took the pups with us and worked a walk in as well.
But Sunday was back to bikes. I rode the Evasion to the first Parkbagging in over two months – Sunset and Sutcliffe parks. We were wrapped up before 3pm, so I made the most of the remaining daylight with a 2-bridge loop around North Van. Of course I couldn’t just stick to the nice lower-elevation paths either.
In fact, it took the better part of an hour just to get through Stanley Park because I chose to take small, often unbikeable trails instead of the main paths. I also ran into an older fella and had a 20 minute chat.
When I did finally reach the bridge, I was treated to the scene below, with a clump of fog holding onto the bridge but with clear air above me. Pretty neat!
By the time I was halfway across North Vancouver, the sun was starting to drop below the horizon. It was a beauty sunset and a really nice day out.
Over the following week I got another after-work loop into town on the Twenty as clear skies became more commonplace.
Rob and I got out after work once again for a very chilly ride up to QE Park, one of the best lookouts in Vancouver proper. It was getting cold enough by the end of the evening that black ice could be a concern, and over the next week just about every night was foggy and below freezing, leading to very slick mornings. I know a few people who bike-commuted and crashed on the ice; I opted to avoid riding to work until temps were comfortably above freezing.
My mornings often looked like this though – frosty grass and lovely sunrises. Soon the sunrise will be too early for me to regularly catch, so I’m enjoying them while I can!
Below is sunrise <> afternoon sun on the same day.
On the 25th we had Parkbagging again, and this time I did a two-bridge loop before ‘bagging instead of after because I had to run a Lynn Valley errand. I left shortly before noon and the frost was still thick in shady areas.
The last few days of the month included a couple more short rides on the Twenty, which has seen quite regular use this month beyond just trips to the store. I am getting back in the habit of the “lunch loop” route, although I’ve been rarely doing so during lunch, which is a ~8km loop around the PNE grounds just to get the blood flowing.
One more of the Twenty, coming home from a Friday beer run.
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