A good time was had by all!
The group met at 9:30 am at the bridge trailhead at the top of Riverside Drive in North Van, (just in time! They make parking there impossible from April onwards, for summer hikers. . .).
I showed them a lesser known route to do the approx. 14+ km hike. Some climbing, just enough for a little workout, but no snow. More sunshine than we had expected! Very few hikers in sight, but lots of mountain bikers. Part of the route involves crossing an old military shooting range, with warnings that there might still be live ordnance in the ground, but that’s by now fairly hypothetical as the trees have re-grown to decent size. It’s a nice and sunny terrain in contrast to the darker forest.
So we all arrived back at the cars in one piece and feeling good!
Mariken