Burnaby Mountain Hike

Burnaby Mountain - Playground of the Gods — Sculptures at the Playground Of The Gods on Burnaby Mountain

Last weekend, Shilpa and Parag invited us to join them on a 10 km hike on Burnaby Mountain. Our previous hike with them was on Mount Seymour last year, so we were looking forward to meeting again.

We had a late start and met at the Burnaby Mountain Conservation Area parking lot at around 10:45 am. The Pandora Trail behind the Horizons restaurants leads to the Trans Canada Trail junction. We turned left at this junction and walked past the Octopus Mural.

Just 10 minutes into the hike we had partial views of the Burrard Inlet.

Network of Trails

The trail network on Burnaby Mountain is quite extensive, and there are multiple junctions. I had downloaded the GPX from Outdoor Vancouver and loaded it in GAIA GPS. I believe Parag was tracking our progress on the All Trails app.

Since we started our hike at the top, we would be hiking down close to Barnet Highway and then making our way back up again at the end.

For the first 3.5 km, the elevation drop is gradual. Past the Trans Canada Trail and Powerline Trail junction, the trail gets relatively steep, and we dropped 140 m in less than one km.

Past the Suncor Refinery, the trail flattens out on Cougar Creek Trail. For the next 2.5 km, the hike was in the open with the Barnet Highway to our right. It was a beautiful but hot day, and the kids were a bit tired at this point.

We hiked past the bike park and crossed the parking lot to join the Mountain Air Trail. It felt good to be back in the forest. We took a long snack break at the top of the first switchback.

Velodrome Trail

After two and half hours, we were at the junction of Mountain Air Trail and Velodrome Trail. From here, it was a steep hike back to the top of Burnaby Mountain.

We stopped frequently and enjoyed the views of the Indian Arm along the way.

Playground Of The Gods

After three hours of hiking, we arrived at the Playground Of The Gods.

“…it is the story Japan’s native peoples, the Ainu, and of the gods who came down to the earth to give birth to them..

These sculptures were dedicated to the citzens of Burnaby in 1990 to commemorate twenty fiver years of goodwill between the Sister Cities of Kushiro, Japan and the District of Burnaby Canada…” – excerpt of the information about the sculptures

While I strolled in the Playground Of The Gods, the kids got busy collecting acorns and had a good time in the park.

In total, the hike was less than 10 km with about 430 m elevation gain/loss. A relatively easy family hike on a beautiful day. Check out Parag’s post in Marathi for the Burnaby Mountain hike.