Participants: L-R: Leeman C, Ryan L, Jason D, Patrick L

Rather late at starting the hike, we only managed to get to the first vista before turning back. At least we got a small tour of Ryan’s giant house. The homeowners have it awesome with an elevator and a CAT! A SNEEZING CAT!

We ended up at Karv’s afterwards where a large chested lawyer-to-be walked right up to Ryan and gave him the smack down, while I miserably munched down on the super salty sandwich thingy I had. Jason also told us back in the day, he used to play mahjong in the smoky underground places full of tea-stained old men and Patrick just listened intently to dust swirling in and out of his ears.

Participants: Kristina D, Emma P, Albert C, Jenny M, Jay V, Patrick L, Jason D, Ryan L, Leeman C

2009, May 24th: Our biggest group ride ever with nine people - three ladies and six guys. Mind you, the people who did the whole 55km’s were Albert, Jenny, Jay, Patrick, Jason, Ryan and I. Kristina made a rendezvous with us on Cypress and King Ed. Emma met up with us at the Lost Lagoon for a ride around the Seawall, then she departed after having a yummy break at the 3rd Beach.

It was a gorgeous sunny day with roughly 17c weather. No casualties.

After that, we went to J Malones in Richmond for a light dinner and drinks. Albert and Jenny left early and Ryan and Jason ended up singing two karaoke songs: “My Way” by Frank Sinatra and some Backstreet Boys song I don’t know the name to. Check out the video of them below:

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2009, May 21st: Jason and Leeman; we started at my place around 12 noon and went to UBC from 16th. He ate a burger and I had a can of Nestea and a bag of chips. However, we didn’t go back to my place. Instead, we kept riding down the Shell trail that starts Ditchmond 40k. Alas, after 5% in, we turned back. Since I had to start fasting around 7:30pm, after my shower, I texted Pat and Jason that I was staying home for dinner.

2009, May 17th: Jason, Patrick and Leeman; getting ‘lost’ again. Regardless and after many turns later, we end up back at the parking lot. Total riding time? Roughly 3 hours. We went to Boston Pizza just around the corner near Squamish and had pizza and nachos. Jason had a Rickard’s White, Pat had an ice tea and I had a Sleeman’s Honey. Then we headed back to Pat’s for another movie. What did we watched? Oh yeah, a Korean movie called… What was it called? [ponders] Ah, it was/is called “Sympathy for Lady Vengeance”.

It is a pretty sick movie, but follows suit with Oldboy. If this is your thing, go for it. Otherwise, I suggest something a ‘little’ less terrible.

2009, May 16th: Jason, Patrick and Leeman; we finally met Kim at Ki Sushi in New Westminster. Pat suggested we ride there instead of riding Ditchmond 40k. Our first ride at night.

2009, May 10th: To finish off what we tried to do on Friday, which was supposed to be a 6pm Ditchmond 40k ride that was cut in half due to my slowness, we went on a 49.7km ride from Richmond to UBC and back. We also did a little Pacific Spirit.

Our ride started at Jason’s place near Steveston around 2:10pm. Went through Pacific Spirit, ended up at The Village, ate at Vera’s Burgers, went to the corner store to check out the cute Korean girl clerk, then rode back home. We had Om… Omelet Fried Rice Japanese Fusion Supreme for dinner and watched The Wrestler.

2009, May 3rd: Pat, Jason and yours truly @ the Vancouver Convention Centre and yes, that is a deliberate blurry picture. We rode from Pat’s place, across the Arthur Liang, up through Cypress and at the Lost Lagoon. Then we explored the new Convention Centre for a bit, then headed to Japadog’s. Afterwards, we rode back home in the chilly weather.

2009, April 26th: Jason, Patrick, Albert, Jenny and Leeman; our first ride to New West and back. We ate at Spaghetti Factory and took a look around before heading back.

This was our most epic hike for the summer. It was a spur of the moment sort of hike so very little preparation was made.

Pat dropped by at my place yesterday around 1pm and we picked Ryan up around 2:15pm. We eventually made it to the Buntzen Lake park around 3pm and started our hike out. It took us roughly an hour and a half to get to our first stop with a gorgeous view of the Lower Mainland. However, by the time we got there, we only had about 2 hours of light left. We pressed on.

At first, we estimated the rest of the hike to take another hour, but about an hour later, we surmised we were lost and we were. Pat kept saying, “Yup, our names are going to be on the news tomorrow.”

At 7:30pm, we could barely see. It was getting colder and the rain was picking up. Fortunately, at that same time, we passed a water station and knew we were getting close according to the map. We finally made it to the parking lot around 7:55pm, where we saw some lights in the near distance and headed there.

This was a complete savior for us as we bumped into cars heading out of the park. You see, the parking lot was pitch black and each lot was pretty long and there were three lots. We surmised they were either park rangers or people that work with BC Hydro. They helped us out a lot by leading us to our car and helped us get out of there.

We ended up eating at Pizza Hut and then I got back home by 10pm. If we were 5 minutes late, we would never have found the park rangers/BC Hydro guys and would have probably been locked inside the park over night.

Participants: Patrick, Ryan and Leeman.

This one was a massive ride from Richmond to Downtown Vancouver to Deep Cove and back to Richmond. Some of the inclines were long and others short but steep. The most brutal incline was on the way back on the 2nd Narrows bridge. It was a 2 minute 6 second ride to the peak but we could have probably rode faster if we ahead first.

The total distance recorded on my bike computer was 76.4 kilometres. If we had took the exact route there and back, it would have been 80 kilometres. Our total time with breaks was roughly 6.5 hours. From Richmond to Deep Cove, it took us 2.5 hours with breaks.

We had a lunch at Deep Cove at Mario’s Cafe. Took some pictures and then headed back. Once we got back to Richmond, we had a dip in the pool and then chilled in the hot tub.

Participants: Albert, Patrick, Ryan and I.