Burnaby Mountain Centennial Park

Burnaby Mountain is located at the northeast of Burnaby, and I believe its east outskirts also fall into Coquitlam and Port Moody territory. It is surrounded by residential areas on all sides except north, where it slides into Burrard Inlet; and there are some residential areas on it as well. Most of it is covered with forests or clearings. At the very top there is the Simon Fraser University, one of the foremost Canadian universities (though relatively small at about 12,000 students from what I recall) so as you may imagine it's a pretty busy place. If this sounds strange, it is - here we have a mountain in the third largest urban centre in Canada and while it's not in the centre of the region, it certainly isn't on its far outskirts either. It is tall enough that your ears will pop when going to or from it. It has long, steep sections of the road so that it isn't rare to be closed to traffic - or at least vehicles that lack power - for a few days during winter or even spring months if the snow falls. And the snow can fall there even if it's not snowing anywhere else in the region.

Somewhere halfway to the top of the Burnaby Mountain there is a Centennial Park. I came to Vancouver in September of 1996, yet I've never been to this park before. Neither did any of my friends. I am not sure why this is, because as you will see it offers plenty of attractions. First, there are spectacular views to north, northeast, west and southwest. Then there are hiking and biking trails all over the mountain. Perhaps it's the perceived remoteness, even though the Simon Fraser University is on the same Burnaby Mountain. If you're coming using public transit, be prepared to walk a kilometre or so, uphill but on the established road. You can't get lost easily. But make sure to take the second bus stop after you leave the residential area, because you'll have to walk an extra kilometre uphill, by or even on the noisy highway (depending on what side of the street you end up on). So don't make the same mistake I did.

If you were driving, coming from Hastings Street, you'd turn left - there's a well marked side road. First you'd be going through the forest but soon the trees would become sparse. The entire side road is less than a kilometre long, as I mentioned. If you're on foot, you will be tempted to take a shortcut over the grass rather than go the long way. Of course, you'll face much steeper path if you do that, and be careful if the weather was wet the day before as you'll end up with mud on your pants to your knees or even above. This didn't happen to me today but it did happen last Friday, though I wasn't on the mountain at the time. Another reason for taking the shortcut was directly tied to the main reason of my visit (which was to assess the status and presence of cherry blossoms) - I strayed off the road when I saw cherry trees in the distance.

One of those trees would be a good spot for hanami. Trees are large and the view is great. I don't mean the view of the parking lot - though it does show that there is plenty of space - but the view beyond it. The only issue here is that some of these trees are on a somewhat steep slope, though I think that's not the case for all of them. Also, there are only three trees in that spot.

Luckily, there are many more cherries just a few dozen meters to the north in what is probably the "designated" picnic place. You can see how it looks from where the first three trees are.

Here are more pictures of the "designated" picnic area.

And this is how the view from that area towards north-northwest looks like.

And immediately to the right of that picture would come this one - this is the Horizons restaurant.

I had an unplanned lunch there, its price is similar to Earls or Milestones (main course is around $16).

As you can see from these pictures, all of these cherry trees have only started to bloom. I'd imagine by this weekend they should be reasonably bloomy to have a picnic under or around them. This is how a typical branch looks like today (April 4, 2006).

To the north, east and west there are fences and lookouts. Here are some pictures from these lookouts.

However! There are signs that this mountain was designed from the ground up to be used for japanese, or shall I say anime/manga style shennanigans. More specifically, field trips! Check it out: we already saw cherry trees, great views as well as a restaurant at the top of the hill where all the teachers can have their lunches. These are all mandatory in order to get the "expedition" to this location in the first place. Now, if you look carefully around, there are plenty more checkpoints.

First, there must be courage trial during the night. And what do you know, there's a circle of stones where certainly some evil spirit is imprisoned. Steven King said so in Dark Tower, so it must be true!

These spirits are sure to roam the woods during courage trials. There are also wild animals that are known to roam this mountain, some of them dangerous. Specifically couguars, as these have certainly been spotted there. I don't think it'd be impossible to get a bear, though I never heard of it actually happen. But for the purpose of pumping up the fear for the courage trial, of course you can tell the fictional story about bears!

Anyhow, after trials are over, the circle of stones can be reused for a bonfire - this can also be done after sports or cultural festivals. Recycling is always good, ne?

Courage trials take place on dark mountain paths. And check it out, there are definitely ominous, foreboding paths here. While I'm not sure if there's a temple deep in the forrest, there are certainly native totems to be found, so this requirement is also satisfied. That big stone might claim it's about rhododendrons, but we all know it serves as the warning to stay away. After all, just a few dozen meters down the path there's the sign "Gate Ahead". What gate? Why, Gate of Hell of course, as featured in Jigoku Shojo and many others! You can clearly see the river flowing through the gate, which is naturally River Sanzu, ferrying dead to the field of flowers beyond it. There is actually a small stream dowhill, which I didn't take picture of but it surely must flow into Sanzu somewhere!

Well, I suppose if you want to nitpick, the hell sign was actually in the opposite direction, meaning out of the forest and not into it, but why sweat the small things?

And we all know what's the purpose of those fear trials - they are always done in boy-girl pairs, and the purpose is to scare girls so that they get into a body contact with their male partner - such as grab their hands, hug them and basically hang onto them, in hope that they will protect them from all those scary things crawling through the forest. In some cases this spark (I'm not talking about the static electricity discharge when their clothes rub, but sure, if that's what rocks your boat) will ignite a relationship. The next morning this might be taken to the next level - taking form of a love confession on one of those sunny clearings.

A few years or more down the road, seeing how most of boys that age are, the girl is probably nothing more than a notch on his belt. It is not inconcievable that the heartbroken girl will become an idol, in which case she might record a song such as "Life" (Bleach 3rd Ending), with lyrics such as this: 

   hi no ataru basho ni dete  
   kono te wo tsuyoku nigitte mita
   ano basho ano toki wo kowashite  
   I can change my life

   ... meaning ...

   I went to a sunny spot 
   and tried holding your hand tightly
   I will destroy that place, that time 
   so I can change my life

She wants to "destroy that sunny place". Naturally, clueless men (judging by myself) will need to listen to the song at least 10 times before they realize it's a love song, and that the girl wants to destroy the memories of the confession and move on with her life, rather than just burn the place to the ground with a plasma torch or something.

Of course, there's also the obligatory hidden millitary installation. This is where all the big robots and their pilots are being hidden. How fortunate that the Horizons restaurant is fully licensed. MADD would be happy.

And if you have any doubts for the need to have a giant robot base here, just consider this rampage that was left by the giant enemy monsters. The road is blocked as the crews are still working on clearing out the mess.