There is a place not far from Vancouver where impeccable singletrack trails wind through lush pine forests, alpine meadows and lakes, and along a series of interconnected wind-swept ridges with spectacular panoramic views.

The Spruce Lake Protected Area in the South Chilcotin Mountain Range is located just 150 km north of Whistler, and 100 km west of Lillooet, B.C, an area which is nearly 72,000 hectares in size.

I was invited to tag along with friends Julie, Glenn, Ward, Jackie and Chloe for the August long weekend. The plan was to make the 5 hour drive on Thursday afternoon, then to run all day on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, returning to our campsite at the Tyax Resort each night. The icing on the cake was that we’d be taking the float plane from the lodge on Sunday morning and getting dropped off at Spruce Lake so that we could run out.

The Golden Ears Trail is a popular hike in Golden Ears Provincial Park, near Maple Ridge, which offers some pretty spectacular views of Pitt Lake, the city, and the surrounding mountains including Mount Baker off in the distance. I ran the trail with friends Matt and Alexa in late July, by which time the snow had mostly melted.

The Sea to Summit trail is an extension of the Upper Shannon Falls trail to the top of the new Sea to Sky Gondola in Squamish, BC.

As a run or fast hike, it takes around 2 hours to summit and is between 6.5 – 9.8 km, depending on your route, with roughly 1,000 metres of elevation gain. It climbs almost double as high as the nearby Stawamus Chief, giving you a great view back down at the massive monolith. Karl and I recently did the hike starting from the Shannon Falls parking lot which is definitely the way to go.

The Annapurna Circuit in Nepal truly is a trail runner’s dream, with untold miles of trails that wind through valleys, along ridges, and over mountains.

While trekking the AC this winter over 2 weeks, I managed to get out for a run every couple of days to explore the trails above the main trekking route a little further. That is, up until about 4,000 metres when running became a little difficult.

Garibaldi Lake is one of the most scenic destinations in BC and is one of my favourite places to run in the summer but, until recently, I had never seen the lake in the winter. A group of us ran to the lake and then on to the meadows in January with our snowshoes in just over 5 hours to and from the Rubble Creek parking lot just south of Whistler.

Check out the video above which I shot using a GoPro 3, along with the photos below from my Instagram feed. You can also read a full trip report from a run to Garibaldi Lake and Panorama Ridge last summer.