Vancouver - West End: English Bay Rollerblading Tips

INLINE SKATING

Welcome to "Blading Vancouver," the first edition of inline skating tips from Lorne Milne, blading instructor and coordinator of the local volunteer "Inline Skate Patrol".

"BLADING VANCOUVER" - part 1

beginner areas | intermediate areas | advanced areas
route map of downtown | check out part 2

Vancouver is one of the best (and most beautiful) places in North America to blade! Ranked #1 in Florida's Fitness and Speek Skating Times, with miles of seawalls, existing bike/skate paths (due to a history of friendliness to bicycles) and varied terrain (due to mountainous hillsides and winding trails around ocean bays and harbours) there is lots of variety for the skating and the views!

There is a great range of places to skate that are suitable for beginners to experts, so keep an eye on future installments as we update you with info on events and other places to skate.

Beginner Areas

First things first...you need to start in a safe flat area (yes, you should take some lessons and should wear all your safety gear including wrist pads, elbow pads, knee pads, helmet and at least one brake).

There are several popular areas to learn:

Sunset Beach Roller Rink, West End: Sunset Beach is nestled between the Aquatic Centre (under the Burrard St Bridge) and the lifeguard shack to the North-West of the Aquatic Centre. This parking lot has been a premiere location for blading in Vancouver since 1994. Many people learn here, there is a roller-hockey rink on the South-East side of the lot, and there's an adjoining roller-rink for beginning skaters and freestylers. Drop by to ride through slalom cones, watch the local stunt bladers do their tricks on their grind rails, or see local roller-dancers show off their chops!

UBC Parking Lot B: This is one of the larger and most open areas to learn in the lower mainland. It is situated to the South-West of UBC Health Sciences Hospital and on the weekends there are very few cars parked there!

UBC Rose Garden Parkade: (Bottom floor-2 floors down). UBC has been extremely gracious by not objecting to people blading down on the bottom floor on rainy days. The bottom floor is virtually car-free, clean a constant temperature, large and well-lit.

Indy Track: Adjoining Science World (along the seawall path at the end of False Creek), the flat, smooth acres of asphalt provide probably the best place to learn to blade in North America — the indy track itself is the largest such track within city limits on the continent. If you're on the Sky Train, get off at Science World or if you're driving, park your car at 1st Avenue and Ontario Streets. The space is available all year long except for a couple weeks in July, when it is converted back to a racing track.

Remember

Wherever you blade, you do so under your own liability and it is your responsibility to avoid accidents and to skate safely. It is vital that we avoid the American mentality of scatter-gun lawsuits to anyone who had the remotest connection to an accident, so that some bozo can try to make a windfall due to their own irresponsibility!! Even though it is unlikely that they could win, the hassle and legal costs are enough for a location to ban blading (which we never want to see!). Presently there are bans on the seawall in West Vancouver andthe Boardwalk and Marine Drive in White Rock. Locally the Volunteer Skate Patrol and the International Inline Skating Association have done a huge amount of work to promote safe skating and avoid bans in places like Stanley Park, Seymour Demonstration Forest and UBC.

Intermediate Areas There are more and more pathways being built to take advantage of your blades. Make sure you have the skills to venture forward (so take lessons that will prepare you for different terrain).

The path under the Skytrain to New Westminster

The blade trail in Port Moody from Rocky Point to Ioco

The road on the North side of the Richmond Airport heading to Iona Island

Tug Boat Landing (in South-East Vancouver on the Fraser River)

Sunset Beach to Science World

Science World to Granville Island (on the south side of False Creek)

Stanley Park (see route map)

The bike/skate path on the North side of the Burnaby Golf Course

The pathway on the south side of the Grandview Cut (from Victoria St. to Van Tech High School)

The bike/skate path around the perimeter of UBC

The creek path from Lions Park in Pt. Coquitlam

The pathway around Lafarge Lake in Coquitlam

Day trips to the Galloping Goose Trail in Victoria

Day trips to intermediate skate routes in Seattle (such as Green Lake and Alki Beach)

Advanced Areas

Make sure you've learned hills skills for stopping, turning, and hill climbing before you try these routes:

Whistler: Although most of the skate paths at Whistler are only intermediate, due to the narrowness and occasional black diamond steepness on a few hills this has to be considered a potentially advanced area.

Seattle's two blading marathons (Solstice Skate every July and the Superskate for MS in early August)

Seymour Demonstration Forest: The Demonstration Forest is definitely advanced intermediate to expert with blue square difficulty to black diamond to double and triple black diamond hills! The first route at Seymour Forest has been ranked as one of North America's top 6 fitness blade paths by New York's Conde Nastmagazine. In 2002 a new $3 million path was completed that exceedes anything anywhere and has become a travel destination for bladers.

Contact LORNE MILNE

Read more about Lorne. For more information about anything you see in these articles or about instruction in inline skating, snow-blading, boarding, skiing or racing, contact Lorne at 604-708-1055 or fax at 604-708-1062.