#YVRFamilyBiking O Christmas Tree Ride Recap

Friday night was the official tree lighting event in Jack Poole Plaza, just west of the new Vancouver Convention Centre downtown. Since it's always more fun to ride with friends, I made it into a Vancouver Family Biking ride & invited everybody.

The weather forecast was less than promising, so I wasn't too hopeful about the turnout. When we got to Science World a bit after 5pm, Nicole & her two girls were waiting, all snuggled up in their bakfiets. After a few minutes of playing & chatting, we headed off, just the seven of us, Christmas lights shining on our cargo bikes & kids belting out their versions of Christmas carols along the Dunsmuir viaduct bike track & down Hornby to the plaza.

The bike racks we could see were behind stairs & a thick crowd of people, so we parked at the hotel across the street, which had a nice corral of widely spaced rings, perfect for getting even a bakfiets into. The kids danced & sang, ignoring most of what was on stage, since they couldn't see it through the crowd anyway. They particularly enjoyed the mascots & numerous stilt performers at the show, as well as a few very friendly dogs who also attended. There was hot chocolate by donation & elves handing out candy canes & then at 7pm, thousands of lights all came on to illuminate the three large & one massive tree set up in the square.

A little later, we bundled the kids back onto the bikes & headed back through the bike lanes eastward. Though the forecast called for rain the whole time, it only really rained for a minute or two on our way home. We were all dressed in head-to-toe rain gear, so we stayed warm & dry the whole evening.

I hadn't been to this event before, but we'll definitely go back again next year. It is so simple to ride to--parking bikes is a breeze right there. The kids had fun & we got them home by 8pm, so it wasn't a particularly late night.


If you're interested in coming on the next group family bike ride, or chatting about family biking with other parents, join the Vancouver Family Biking Facebook Group.

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