Running Home

A 50km trail ultra along the TransCanada Trail

Usually when people decide to run this far, there is some preparation involved.

Training, nutrition and testing gear as you gradually add more and more miles is pretty standard. Shortly before the long run, you taper, reducing your mileage and output to make sure that on the day in question, you are as physically and mentally prepared as possible.

I didn’t do any of that.

Instead, I looked at the weather the day before, decided my legs weren’t that sore from a week of ski touring and set my alarm for 4:30 a.m. All of which helps to explain why at least a dozen times during this run, I loudly asked myself “what am I doing out here”?

That answer will take a bit of explanation and a brief aside about what exactly you’re now reading.

In the fall of 2024, I moved from Squamish to Cultus Lake, a small community just outside of Chilliwack in British Columbia’s Fraser Valley.

If I’m being honest, this part of BC has always confused me. As a kid growing up in Alberta, Chilliwack was a classic rock band that played during Grey Cup halftime shows and on beer garden stages. When I moved to Vancouver, it was the place you stopped for cheap gas, somewhere that corn came from and the but of a lot of jokes about the smell of manure. It wasn’t until I started to explore the Cascade mountains and paddle the Chilliwack River that things started to change.

On one hand, the flat farmlands reminded me of my childhood in the prairies. Trucks outnumbered cars, there was a distinctly working class attitude and it wasn’t odd to run into a farm implement on a local roadway. But, beyond this pastoral tableau towered the northern edge of the Cascade Mountains. Drive a few minutes off the TransCanada Highway, round a traffic circle and head up into the Chilliwack River Valley and you entered into a world of tall trees, rushing rivers and towering peaks.

This juxtaposition intrigued me. When I moved out here, I decided I wanted to better understand this slice of southwestern BC. For me, understanding has always been best achieved by spending time exploring a place under my own power – adventuring for lack of a better term.

So, here’s the plan. Every month in 2025, I will explore a different aspect of my new home to try and learn something about it. To give it some structure, I’m using a concept called “micro-adventures”. Popularized by writer and explorer Alastair Humphreys, the idea is simple. Small local trips that start and end at my doorstep, all built around exploring something or somewhere new and unique. When Humphrey’s undertook his project in 2011, he earned National Geographic’s "Explorer of the Year” award. I’m just hoping for some perspective. And, to force some accountability on myself, I have decided to write about it in a regular newsletter.

Now that you’re sufficiently caught up, back to the story of micro-adventure #1, a 50+ kilometre trail run along the TransCanada Trail from Chilliwack Lake back to my house in Cultus Lake.

Before settlers came to these lands, what it now known as the Chilliwack River Valley was home to a vibrant society of interconnect Indigenous villages. Known as the Ts’elxwéyeqw (anglicized to Chilliwack) peoples, both oral history and archeology trace thousands of years of their history in these lands.

In 2021, as part of a broader effort around Indigenous recognition and rights, BC Parks renamed Chilliwack Lake Provincial Park to Sxótsaqel. The term, a Halq’eméylem word, means “sacred lake” and staring out the lake in the predawn light, it was easy to understand why.

Across the lake, the snow capped peaks were just coming into view. Mist rose off the water and my breath hung in the air. It was a good reminder that even though there wasn’t any snow on the ground, it was late December and I only had about eight hours of daylight to burn.

I started through the provincial park campground, closed and abandoned for the winter. I crossed a narrow bridge over the Chilliwack River, frost on the wooden panels crunching under my shoes. Across the bridge, I joined a well built trail switchbacking up to a bench where winding single track followed the upper reaches of the river.

I reached my first trail junction a few kilometres later. To the left and up, the single track continued up towards the peaks that tower above Chilliwack Lake’s western shore. To my right, the TransCanada Trail turned down the valley. I turned right.

Described as “the longest multi-use trail system in the world” the TransCanada Trail is a series of trails, waterways and roads that stretch all across Canada. Work connecting the trails started in 1992 and was officially “finished” to celebrate Canada’s 150th anniversary in 2017. The Chilliwack River Valley section of the trail makes up a little more than 50 of the 27,000 kilometres of trail that stretch from coast to coast.

Looking up at cloudless sky, I lamented my decision to spend today running instead taking advantage of a cool, clear day to go skiing. Before long, the single track widened and flattened out. I crossed provincial park boundary, joined an old road and started moving through history.

In the mid 19th century, the Hudson’s Bay Company arrived in this valley. In 1855 they cut a formal trail, establishing the first western travel route between the Fraser Valley and Chilliwack Lake. A few years later, when a gold strike in the Fraser Canyon set off a rush of prospectors, this trail became a major travel route. When the gold dried up and appetites shifted to timber at the end of the century, the valley became home to a major logging operation. By the 1920’s, a railroad was running up and down the valley, servicing the booming logging industry.

The sound of a chainsaw firing up snapped me out of a mid-run daze somewhere around the 10 kilometre mark. The trail had transitioned from wide double track into a newly graded, fully operational logging road. TransCanada Trail markers reassured me that I was still on the right route, but the sounds of machinery grew louder with every step.

I rounded a corner to find a fresh cut block. High on a ridge above me, a piece of bright red earth moving machinery stood like a sentinel against the white, snow covered slope behind. Below it, hundreds of trees lay like matchsticks.

I moved quickly through the logging area, careful of any blind corners where a lone trail runner would surely lose a battle with a truck or a piece of heavy equipment. To my right and left, golden morning sunshine lit up the surrounding peaks, For the second time that day, I wondered why I hadn’t just gone skiing.

I ran a few more kilometres of gravel road and I slowed to check the map on my phone. I realized had passed the turn onto the next stretch of trail a few hundred meters back. I spun on my heel, jogged back and found the turn near a massive blue and green sign. Faded from years of weather, the sign declared in capital letters “SALMON HABITAT r*STORATION PROJECT”. The R and the E of restoration were fading away. The sign explained details of the “Centennial Sidechannel and Ponds” meant to remedy “forest harvesting practices of the past [that] have led to damage of previously productive salmonid habitats.”

Past this sign, the trail followed a series of crystal clear channels and ponds established to promote salmon and steelhead habitat in the upper valley. A fecund smell of decomposition hung in the air and, before long, I had to break my stride to avoid a rotting salmon carcass.

Every fall, salmon return to rivers across southwestern BC to spawn. Bears, birds and other predators feed on them. When the salmon die, their decomposing bodies return nutrients to the soil, feeding lush forests along BC’s salmon rivers. When the trees and plants then die, they decompose, releasing nitrogen into the streams and rivers. These nutrients feed the same aquatic plants and insects that then become food for the next generation of salmonids.

About 20 kilometres into my run, I was feeling pretty good. I had been running along these habitat restoration channels on and off for the past hour. Occasionally, a bald eagle would flash across the skyline, perching in high branches and peering down from the canopy overhead with keen eyes. I rounded a bend of single track and noticed a small bench built along the edge of a glassy pool. I slowed to a walk and peered into the water, watching a foot long fish streaked with dark red swim lazily in the easy current. A winter Steelhead.

Steelhead are rainbow trout that spawn in freshwater rivers then travel downstream into the ocean where they live out most of their lives. To most people, they wouldn’t look much different than a salmon, but to fisherman, especially those that use fly rods, steelhead are spoken about in hushed, reverent tones. Steelhead run in the winter, typically during the coldest, wettest months. Chasing steelhead means spending hours standing in cold rivers, often in driving rain and even snow. Usually, you don’t catch anything. The fish are notoriously hard to land, something I can attest to having spent nearly a decade fly fishing and never managing so much as a casual nibble from one. It is also possible that I am just a terrible angler.

I stopped by the pool and stared down. I breathed out and reached into my backpack for my camera. Before I could snap a shot, the fish flicked it’s tail and disappeared up the small creek.

Not long after, I crossed the 25 kilometre mark. This was officially the longest run I had ever done and my legs were starting to feel it. After a short downhill, I popped out of the woods onto a narrow section of trail paralleling the Chilliwack Lake Road . I looked ahead at the sign for the Government of Canada fish hatchery located where Slesse Creek meets the Chilliwack River, I landed funny on my right foot and rolled my ankle. A shot of pain cracked up the right side of my foot. Gingerly, I took a few step. It certainly didn’t feel good, but I could bear the weight. I limped the next few hundred meters past the fish hatchery and over the Slesse Creek bridge.

Sharing it’s name with the spire like Slesse Peak – the anglicized version of Selísi, a Halq’eméylem place name meaning “fang” – Slesse Creek is one of many tributaries that flow into the Chilliwack River. In the late 19th century, gold was discovered near it’s headwaters and mining began. By 1905 a wagon road called the Mount Baker trail was constructed to move materials and supplies across the US border. Today, the Slesse Creek Forest Service Road follows along a similar path.

I dug a Clif Bar out of my backpack and sipped some water as I crossed the wide parking area downstream of Slesse Creek. I slowed down to chat with a few fisherman enjoying a mid morning libation.

“Are you doing some kind of long hike?” They asked me.

“Running, Chilliwack Lake to Cultus Lake,” I responded, still with a wad of half chewed bar in my mouth.

They looked at me like I had just told them I was building a homemade rocket to get to the moon.

Below Slesse Creek, I was back on familiar terrain. I had paddled the stretches of whitewater that ran from here back to the Vedder Bridge for years. But, while I had spent countless hours in the water, I had only been on this section of the trail once.

New and rebuilt bridges dotted the trail. I hadn’t thought much of it above Slesse Creek until I saw a newer sign affixed beside a recent rebuilt crossing. It explained that this bridge and handful of others had been rebuilt in 2022 and 2023 following major flooding in 2021. That November, all across the Fraser Valley, more than 300mm of rain fell over the course of a few days delivering more than a months worth of rain in one go. Rivers swelled, banks overflowed and floods all across the region washed out everything from fields to bridges and highways.

My partner Katie had driven out to Thurston Meadows to deliver me some real food and a coffee. I’m sure there are many good reasons not to drink coffee in the middle of a long run like this, but when it’s cold and you’ve been awake and running since dawn, none of them mattered to me. I downed a breakfast burrito and the coffee, followed by a few leftover Christmas cookies, before refilling my water and heading back out the trail.

My right ankle – the one I had rolled about ten kilometres back – was stiff and sore, shortening my entire right stride. My hip flexors hurt and I was pretty sure I had a few blisters forming on my toes.

I ran past another salmon habitat restoration project sign at Anderson Ponds. This one even more faded and listing in the soft earth. The trail ran close beside the paved road and after a few meters on the pavement, I plunged back into the woods and started climbing.

Another new section of trail rolled out in front of me. Built in 2023 by the Chilliwack Outdoor Club and others, the Tolmie Ridge trail would have probably been some sublime single-track. But, nearly forty kilometres into this run, I was in what endurance athletes call “the pain cave”. Every step hurt. I had long past given up on running uphill and instead focused on just putting one foot in front of the other. I was vaguely aware of the time, but figured looking too closely at my watch might bring the onset of darkness faster.

A few kilometres further, the trail deposited me onto the Tamihi Forest Service Road and then onto another stretch of beautiful trail beside the river. I tore open an energy gel and squeezed it into my mouth. It tasted like a pile of melted cola bottle candies. Consciously, I knew it was pretty disgusting, but some deep childhood memories of eating 5 cent candies overrode my rational brain and I savoured what can only be described as goo.

When the trail ended I popped back onto a gravel road. Any pretence of taking in the scenery was gone. From here on, the TransCanada Trail followed a series of logging roads that bisected a network of ATV trails. Ahead of me, the road climbed up to a high bench and I settled into the fastest pace I could manage. My muscles screamed a little with every step as I climbed the hill looking like some kind of wounded antelope.

A few kilometres back, I had crossed the threshold that allowed me to call this run an “ultramarathon”. Technically speaking an ultramarathon is anything longer than the recognized marathon distance of 26.2 miles or 42.16 kilometres.

Named for the Battle of Marathon, the story goes that Greek soldier Pheidippides ran from Marathon to Athens to carry word of victory over the Persian army. That run was about 25 miles or 40 kilometres and only told part of the story. Before his famous run, Pheidippides ran from Marathon to Sparta to gather more troops. On that route, he traveled more than 150 miles, which goes some way to explaining why he collapsed and died shortly after he finally arrived in Athens.

None of that actually explains why a marathon is 26.2 miles. That number comes from the 1908 at the London Olympics when the Queen requested a footrace that would start at Windsor Castle and end at the Olympic Stadium. That distance just happened to be 26.2 miles, and the modern marathon was officially born.

None of this has anything to do with my story, I just think it’s kind of funny and is exactly the kind of inane thoughts I was distracting myself with as I interchanged between jogging – more accurately shuffling – along short, flat sections and walking – more accurately trudging – any hills.

Close to the next logging road intersection, I met up with partner Katie. After returning home from delivering me food, she brought our dog Murphy out to pace me and provide some distraction and motivation for the final few kilometres to Cultus Lake.

The name Cultus comes from an Indigenous trade language known as Chinook Jargon. Considered a “pidgin” or creole language – basically a mix of other languages – it was used by nations all throughout what is not called the Pacific Northwest. Linguists debate whether the language pre-dates the arrival of settlers, but by the late 19th century it’s use was widely documented and included both English and French words.

In Chinook Jargon, Cultus has negative connotations, sometimes said to mean “bad” or “used up”. The reason behind the name Cultus Lake isn’t definitively understood, but stories connect it to tales about supernatural creatures living in the lake. In the local Indigenous dialect, Cultus Lake is called Swílhcha’ which means "an empty basin that quickly filled with water” or “somebody died”.

We passed mountain bike trails, waved to a family out for an ATV ride and calmed our dog when the crack of a gunshot spooked him. The road flattened out for the final stretch and Katie kept a conversation running to keep my mind off the stabs of pain that came with every footfall.

As the sun started to set and we hit pavement, the sky shot across with an orange glow. Mist rose of the forests and for the first time in a while, I checked my watch. I had run more than 50 kilometres with a couple more to go before we made it home. We would make it home before dark.