Chase Norvan Falls at Lynn Headwaters

Locals' pick over Capilano: a free 50-metre suspension bridge over a roaring gorge, with emerald swimming holes and no eighty-dollar admission guilt.

A West Vancouver forest walk past 300-year-old cedars to two waterfalls that make you instinctively lower your voice without agreeing to.

West Van's secret swim spot: 5 km of forest trail, 200 metres up, and a dock built for cannonballs.

Six flat kilometres along Burrard Inlet to a sandy beach at Old Orchard Park. Most first-timers never make it.

A flat forest walk along an emerald creek to a waterfall that roars in spring and turns swimmable by late summer.

Vancouver showing off everything it has in one gloriously flat, car-free, 10 km loop where the ocean is the only map you need.

Four kilometres of gentle climbing buys you a wooden platform over Howe Sound with Bowen Island below and the city behind you.

A forest hike in Pinecone Burke to two waterfalls, ending at the jagged Sawblade cascade that earns its extremely good name.

The 4.4 km Deer Lake loop wraps in under an hour and deposits you beside a rowboat rental and Burnaby's heritage district.

An 11-km round trip on the Howe Sound Crest Trail delivering clifftop lunch and ferries crawling below like bath toys.

A big ridge loop above Buntzen Lake named for its ten views over Indian Arm, reserved for people who mean it.

A 25 km river loop around all of Port Coquitlam, almost zero hills, salmon in the water and absolutely no pressure to finish it.

The date that earns its smugness: 2,830 steps up, Skyride gondola down, beers and jelly legs at the top.

Big-sky dyke-top walking where the Fraser meets the sea, with a 10-metre treehouse that grown adults are absolutely allowed to climb.