When I think of Vancouver, I think of a city surrounded by the world’s greatest outdoor adventures. Now that may sound like pretty high praise for someone that has barely made it out of Canada. But the mountains, the valleys, the ocean, the forests and the cliffs all within an hour drive of the heart of the city, in my opinion, cannot be topped.
I guess what it really boils down to is when I describe Vancouver, I describe it as a city that is great to leave. I’ve had first hand accounts of friends coming Vancouver and getting bored of the main “city” attractions that can be found after just a few days. Once we opened their eyes to the amount of activities that can be done outside of the city, and outdoors, within a 30 minute drive, their perspective did a complete flip. They then realized, they did not book a long enough trip!
And what I’ll be focusing on today is a famous one in the city, known as Vancouver’s Triple Crown.
What is this “Triple Crown”?
Vancouver’s Triple Crown, a name fitting for the challenge that awaits on Vancouver’s famous North Shore. The deal is, Vancouver’s North Shore has 3 main mountains. From East to West, the order is Mt. Seymour, Grouse Mountain, and Cypress Mountain. And if anyone is doing the quick maths, the Triple Crown is road-cycling these 3 mountains in a single day.
The order is not important, although there is good debate in the cycling community as to which order is the best order. This answer is really where you start from around the city, and whether you want to save the worst or the best for last – everyone’s got their own preference in that! More on that later.
The guidelines are also relatively simple: an unwritten rule of heading back to around sea level between every mountain, before beginning the ascent up to the next mountain. Aside from that, not much else! Just get riding.
Start of the Big Day
I decided to set out on the Triple Crown on Monday, June 20th. This was two days after I biked the Sea to Sky from Pemberton to Vancouver, an 160km massive bucket list ride that may get it’s own destination spotlight one day. Needless to say, I was still sore setting out in the morning on the 20th. But it was my window in Vancouver and I meant to make the most of it!
My friend from high school, Brandon, had relocated out to Vancouver a year and a half ago. It’s always good to see him, and he’s been a huge help when we’re out that way and offering up a place to stay. He lives in the desirable Kitsilano, so I rolled on out around 11:30am towards Stanley Park and the Lion’s Gate Bridge.
Decision Time
I decided while route building that I would complete the crowns in the order of Mount Seymour, Grouse Mountain, and finally Cypress Mountain. The main reason was Mount Seymour is the largest and toughest climb, and getting it done first seemed like the best option.
Another reason was Cypress Mountain, the second largest, was the closer mountain to the Lion’s Gate Bridge. With Kitsilano being both the start and end point, having the shortest return bike at the end of the day also seemed optimal.
Mount Seymour – First Crown
And as I just said, Mount Seymour is a monster. The mountain contains a paved road to the summit containing multiple switchbacks up the south side of the mountain. The climb itself runs 900 metres uphill (summiting out at 1040m) over 12.16km, at an average grade of 7%. To put it in perspective for the Ontario folks, the CN tower is 553m in height, so Mt. Seymour is 1.9x the height of the CN tower.
Side note, that’s probably how I’ll start comparing mountains and climbs. Just throw in the CN tower for reference. Everyone knows the CN tower is tall, right?!
I arrived at the base of Mount Seymour about 1hr and 25mins into the ride. While already a solid day on the bike if I turned around at this point, I began the climb.
Roughly 5 switchbacks and 58 minutes later, I was at the top of the climb, smiling down at the world, eating my swedish berries. Seymour itself is a goal for a lot of cyclists in Vancouver, and I was already proud for making it to the top. But I wanted more, and I knew I had two more mountains to go before the true Triple Crown could be awarded.
I began the descent, not getting far before a big black bear ran out onto the road, right in my path. Once it noticed me, it stopped and stared until the combination of my yelling and hurling 45km/hr towards it finally got it moving. Thankfully it took my advice and darted from the road before I had to bail.
There were no more incidents on the descent of Mt. Seymour, and I made my way down to North Vancouver and over towards Grouse Mountain.
Grouse Mountain – Second Crown
Grouse is the shortest of the 3 crowns. This mountain is known for its hike, the “Grouse Grind,” which I’ll likely be discussing later on in the blog. But a quick synapsis, there is a parking lot at the bottom of the mountain, both a hike and a gondola to the summit, and tourist attractions at the top including a wildlife refuge, dining, shopping, disc golf, etc. The wildlife refuge contains two grizzly bears, always the hottest attraction at the top of the mountain!
There is no paved road that runs to the top of Grouse, therefore the second crown consists of a climb from the midst of North Vancouver to the parking lot for the start of the gondola. Some purists have decided that the gravel road running up to the summit is also part of the triple crown, but there’s a big difference between a purist and a tourist. And I am most definitely the latter.
I don’t have too much to share about this one, except the traverse from Mount Seymour to Grouse Mountain can get a little confusing on the North Vancouver roads. I ended up in the neighborhoods under Grouse, hiking my bike up and over bridges and ravines. It was not the near the exact route I’ve seen from other Triple Crown route files, but it worked well enough and I eventually made it up to the “top” of Grouse!
Stats for Grouse, the parking lot sits around 302m above sea level. This normally would be a straight ~300m climb, but getting lost in the neighborhoods and a few construction projects probably added another 100m of climbing onto the day. 100m that I definitely did not need. At the top of Grouse, I was 74km into the ride at 4 hours of pedaling.
Swedish berries and clif bars were my saviours of the day, and the gas station stop on the way down for icecream and a rootbeer was much required. I felt a bit more energized going into the third crown, Cypress Mountain, for the final climb of the day.
Cypress Mountain – Third Crown
Heading back from Grouse towards West Vancouver, Cypress Mountain awaits as the Third Crown. This is on the same level as Mt. Seymour, as in you’re going all the way to the summit, no stopping short like Grouse!
Cypress Mountain affords stunning views of the Pacific Ocean as well as the city of Vancouver. The paved road climb consists of a few spectacular viewpoints and picnic spots to enjoy the day, whether biking or driving.
All hyped up on candy and pop, looking forward to a nap at the end of it all, I started at the water from Ambleside Park to the top of Cypress. That’s a climb from sea level to 915m of elevation, with an average grade of around 5% the entire way up, over 20km.
Talk about a mighty effort to make it up that mountain. I took a rest stop at the first viewpoint, and met a few locals completing the Cypress climb after their day of work. It’s pretty amazing to think that there are some people over in Vancouver just crushing these climbs weekly!
A ‘local legend’ on Strava is someone who has the most completions of a segment over 90 days. Someone on Cypress named Joerg, the local legend, has done the mountain 42 times in the last 90 days! That’s hard to even comprehend, even after doing it just the once.
After arriving at the top of Cypress at 6pm, I realized how cold it had gotten at the higher elevation. The people I had met at the viewpoint had also arrived at the summit, and were loading up on jackets and arm warmers before starting the descent.
And here I am, in a summer jersey and shorts, throwing on finger-less gloves as my only warmth. HA. It was a chilly descent but we made it, and cruised the 30km across the Lion’s Gate Bridge and Stanley Park into Kitsilano.
Statistics for the Day
Overall, the day doing the Triple Crown in Vancouver was 139 km, with 2,828 metres of elevation climbing and a moving time of 5 hours and 56 minutes. The overall time elapsed, between riding, eating snacks, and staring at the ground debating all my life choices, was 7 hours and 14 minutes.
I was estimated to have burned about 5,600 calories during the day, likely fully replenished through ice cream, candy and chips. Snacks of champions, from what I’ve heard.
Triple Crown Recommendation
I can’t recommend this ride enough. The day itself was massive, but even separating out each individual mountain is a tough and worthy challenge.
For those that have done the Triple Crown, I learned from the locals on Cypress that “true bragging rights comes from doing these 3 crowns, and topping it off with Burnaby Mountain at the end of the day.” Well, I guess I don’t have true bragging rights, but it gives me another reason to head back out there and do it all over again! Can’t wait!
Thanks for reading everyone, and sorry for the delay on the post. I came back to Ontario last week, and between the travel and a few family events, it’s been a little hectic.
Cheers all, hope you enjoyed it! Can’t wait to see your own stories on the Triple Crown.
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