Seven Reasons to Pedal Your Bike – Seven Summits Trail, Rossland, BC

While I have always tried to maintain a healthy balance between shuttling my downhill rig and pedaling my way to the top, I usually reach for the keys when presented with an option of day-long ripping. However, since we moved to Rossland, BC, things have changed considerably.

In addition to the seemingly endless single track from our front door, there is one epic gem of a cross-country ride that should be a must for any rider, and that’s Rossland’s Seven Summits Trail – hallmarked as one of IMBA’s Epic Rides in North America.

For those of us suckered by the shuttle, you’ll still feel at home as you’ll need to drop a vehicle and drive to the top of this one-way pedal paradise. Of course, there are other options if you like the idea of road riding your mountain bike for another 20+ kms to link the ride in to a mind and body-bending loop or, even more daunting, an out-and-back epic of epics.


Despite the shuttle, however, this isn’t to say you won’t have to pedal – oh, pedal you will with 3,000 feet of gain – but once you gain the sub-alpine ridge you’ll be treated to some of the most spectacular, diverse and exciting single track anywhere. The most common and probably most enjoyable way to ride this trail is North to South, finishing on the intermediate downhill Dewdney Trail (built as a packhorse trail connecting the West Kootenays to the Boundary Region in 1865).


There’s a new alternate start we learned about the day after our ride – at Nancy Green Summit, look behind the parking sign to access this new trailhead.

While I could wax poetic, I’m not going to detail every stanza of this piece of pedal poetry – I’ll let these images of our most recent ride do the speaking…Happy trails!


(Special thanks to Nicola Kuhn for gracing the stunning scenery with skill and style)



-Ryan Kuhn