Six hours west of Calgary, AB, and eight hours east of Vancouver, tiny Valemount, BC, has morphed from a waystation to a destination for mountain bikers throughout western Canada and beyond, thanks to Valemount Bike Park.
Occupying an enviable position at the intersection of three mountain ranges and in the shadow of iconic Mount Robson, the tallest peak in the Canadian Rockies, Valemount has long attracted snowmobilers. But its status as a dirt destination didn’t materialize until a dozen years ago. And mountain bikers have sledheads to thank for it.
Snowmobilers built a bike park, and it changed everything
Around 2012, a local mountain bike club solicited the International Mountain Biking Association (IMBA) to develop a trails master plan for the steep lower slopes of Mount McKirdy on the east edge of downtown, but that club had no capacity to turn the lines on a map into reality.
“Then, in 2014, I convinced a bunch of snowmobile businesses to build mountain bike trails,” says Curtis Pawliuk, the long-time executive director of Valemount and Area Recreation Development Association (VARDA).
Formed as a snowmobile club in the ’90s, VARDA transitioned to a recreation development organization in 2004. In the early 2010s, though, trail building was still as new to the organization as it was to the area. Nonetheless, VARDA stepped up to shepherd the trails plan that was to become Valemount Bike Park.
A lifelong mountain biker who grew up three hours to the west in Prince George, surrounded by the plentiful trails of the Thompson-Okanagan region, Pawliuk knew the struggle—and potential—of an empty map. Twelve years and roughly as many project phases later, Valemount Bike Park has grown from lines on a map to a true destination.
More than 50 miles of trails span two mountains and 2,300 feet of vertical
More than 50 miles of trails span the bases of two mountains flanking Valemount. The 5 Mile Road zone boasts the bulk of the bike park’s directional trails, and a second trailhead at Swift Creek accesses a newer network of traditional cross-country trails. Although pedalers can access the top of the 5 Mile zone via CBT’s Munday Grind, a loping, forested climbing trail, the vast majority of riders shuttle the 5 Mile Access Road, a well-graded gravel road suitable for two-wheel-drive vehicles. Lower- and mid-mountain landings allow riders to section off as much of the 2,300 feet of vertical as they care to, with multiple options in the mix anywhere on the mountain. The wood features of Womp Rat and the low-consequence doubles of Bacon by NDIT make great palette cleansers to finish off a top-to-bottom run or a hot lap for short-timers or those just short on time.
“Our goal was, the way the topography works, every segment, if the land would allow it, we wanted at least a green, blue, and a black,” says Pawliuk.
From the top of the shuttle road, riders can drop into a handful of blue descents. But the highlight of the upper trail system is the black-diamond High Roller, often referred to as “A-Line of the North” by repeat visitors, and for good reason: the big airs are matched only by the big views.
A top-to-bottom lap that’ll make you a believer
For a project that’s snowballed through phases as fast as a lap down High Roller, the trails feel remarkably of a piece, and of their place, sculpted into the glacier-ground granite boulders and boreal forest characteristic of this region. A top-to-bottom run on High Roller, Turducken, Stump Town, and Moby Dick highlights the diversity and cohesion of the network: the skyscraping tables of High Roller flow naturally into the rock booters and drops of Turducken, which in turn flow into the snaking sidehill roots of Stump Town.
“If you can find a better lap, I’d love to see it,” says Pawliuk. “And if you can ride it without stopping, I won’t believe you.”
The views give riders reason to stop and get out their phones, though. From the top of the trail system, riders look across the Rocky Mountain Trench, with the peaks of the Cariboo Mountains framing the tabletops and doubles of High Roller, and the bike park appearing to hover over the town of Valemount.
How a bike park became the heartbeat of a town of 900
It’s representative of the way the bike park has come to have an outsized presence in this town of 900. Pawliuk is upfront that VARDA built the trails primarily to drive tourism.
Owing to its location as a portal to Jasper National Park and a stop on the Yellowhead Highway, which connects the four westernmost provinces of Canada, Valemount has always done a good business with the gas-and-go crowd of long-haul truckers and road-tripping families. But the challenge, as with many towns this size, is how to get cars—and money—flowing into downtown.
“I’ve been in this role for 20 years, and our goal was always ‘How do we get people to pull in off the highway?’ Then, ‘How do we get them to stay for two days?'”
VARDA tapped into the massive market of snowmobilers, many of them skewing younger and in search of a second hobby, who were already familiar with Valemount, to raise awareness of the park. Coupled with word of mouth amongst mountain bikers in the region, the bike park’s reputation grew as quickly as its trail mileage did.
It’s always easy to oversell the “mountain biking saved our town” narrative, but in Valemount, the bike park is such a prominent part of the city’s identity that its role in the growth of the community can’t be denied. Now, one of the first things drivers see after the street-spanning Valemount welcome arch are signs directing them through downtown toward the bike park.
“Don’t get me wrong, it surprised us all,” says Pawliuk. “We had no idea the impact it would have on the community.”
“You look at the bike shops, which weren’t even thought of until halfway through the history of this trail system. You look at the pizzeria, the food trucks, the Yellowhead Campground, which is full all summer long with bikers—none of that would be sustainable without the trail system,” says Pawliuk.
Some riders, having experienced the bike park, have chosen to stay much more than a long weekend: Pawliuk credits the trails for expanding the demographics of the community as families and retirees relocate to Valemount.
“We have people selling houses in Revelstoke to move to Valemount, but they wouldn’t have done that if the trails weren’t here,” says Pawliuk. “To have people leave Squamish, and leave Revy, to come to Valemount, those are pretty cool success stories for the town.”
Pull into the 5 Mile parking lot on a summer weekend, and, amongst the pop-up shelters and portable grills, there are plates from all throughout BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Washington—impressive for anywhere, let alone a community of 900 that’s six hours from any city with a six-figure population. Turns out, the middle of nowhere is halfway to everywhere.
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