MEGAVOLT IN SQUAMISH

October 27, 2026

By Saturday evening at MegaVolt, riders were getting ready to head into the Squamish forest with lights on their bikes. After the afternoon I’d had, a chair beside the campfire, refreshments, and conversation sounded like a perfectly good adventure.

I’ve never been the biggest fan of night rides. I was also tired, having just ridden the most demanding technical descent of my life. My legs had contributed quite enough to the story for one day. As the lights headed toward the trails, I stayed with people who, two days earlier, had been strangers. I felt entirely comfortable with my selection from the evening’s menu.

That freedom to choose was part of MegaVolt’s appeal. Run by the team behind BC Bike Race, the three-day eMTB festival brings together racing, guided and social rides, challenges, and an industry expo. Its 2026 expansion brought editions to Cowichan Valley and Squamish. My weekend was the autumn Squamish gathering, based at MTN Fun Basecamp beside the Alice Lake and Highlands trail network. You could chase a clock, explore with a guide, or see where a waypoint hunt took you. Between rides, everyone came back to camp.

I had driven north from Seattle to ride and cover the event for The Loam Wolf. I’d hoped to bring a friend, but arrived alone. By the time I chose that seat at the fire, finding someone to hang out with had become the easiest part of the weekend. Getting there took a few extra laps, a visit to a swamp, and some reconsideration of what I thought I could ride.

Room at the fire

I reached Squamish around noon Thursday, visited Shannon Falls, wandered downtown, and took in the waterfront beneath the Stawamus Chief. I’ve wanted to travel with a camera and bring home stories since I was a kid watching National Geographic. These days, that curiosity travels with an electric mountain bike.

After provisioning, I reached MTN Fun Basecamp around 2:30. Trails led out from camp, and Dialed In Cycling operated on the grounds. The campground and shop are separate businesses, but rentals, mechanical help, and local riding expertise are useful amenities to have near your tent. Dialed In also sponsored MegaVolt, offered participants discounted rentals, and led rides on all three days. I’d come to appreciate their guides’ contribution more personally on Sunday.

First, though, I needed to get the tent up. The organizers greeted me before they knew who I was, and a neighboring camper invited me to join his old North Shore buddies around the fire. Another neighbor offered to collect anything I’d forgotten during his trip into town. He returned with an adapter for my campsite’s RV outlet so I could charge my electronics. Getting him to accept repayment took considerably more persistence than getting him to help.

The tent went up between conversations and beer breaks. It would have gone up faster without them. I would have enjoyed it less.

Over dinner and time around the fires, I met riders whose histories together stretched across the North Shore, Vancouver Island, Squamish, and Whistler. Careers and families had made getting together harder. Middle-aged dads who still want to ride bikes understand that scheduling problem. They’d set aside this weekend to do something about it, and there was room for me, too.

When we talked later, returning participant Shaun Rivers put words to that reunion. “North Shore, bro!” was his introduction. I had found a repeat offender, although the offenses appeared to involve riding bikes and enjoying himself. He described a gathering of friends that had grown from perhaps four people to anywhere from 15 to 32. Racing was a bonus; seeing one another and collecting “high fives in the woods!” were the attraction.

“Every campfire is open for somebody to come sit by,” he told me. That matched my experience from the moment I arrived. Their shared history could have left me on the outside, but instead they basically adopted me. Before turning a pedal, I had somewhere to sit.

Extra laps and a little humility

By Friday afternoon, I had people to hang out with and trails to discover. The Social Ride introduced me to Squamish and, fairly quickly, to the back of the group.

I was coming off illness and injury, hadn’t ridden my Vala in nearly a month, and had a shoulder doing its best to remain a topic of conversation. My confidence needed time to catch up with the soaking-wet trails. People will tell you a Squamish blue is a black somewhere else. I wouldn’t make that a universal conversion formula, but these blues felt considerably more technical than many I knew near Seattle.

Shaun later passed along another rider’s description of the network as “a bucket of snakes.” Wet roots crossing steep slopes helped me understand the comparison. A color on a map can only tell you so much.

As the leaders pulled away, two members of the medical staff, acting as sweepers, caught up with me and a few other riders. We became our own smaller group. Sometimes I’m one of the faster guys; sometimes I’m dead last. I was frustrated with myself, but still looking forward to testing my technical climbing at the Hill Climb Challenge.

Our route had other plans. As I understood it, the wet weather had prompted a last-minute course change. Our sweepers, both from Vancouver Island, got turned around trying to reach the challenge, and we repeated Mikes Loop, Of Mice and Men, and Tracks from Hell. That last trail includes a narrow wooden boardwalk over swampy ground. On our first pass, I fell into the swamp. Apparently, merely observing the local environment wasn’t immersive enough.

We eventually rejoined the others as the Hill Climb was finishing. Missing it was disappointing, but the sweepers had been encouraging, and my companions had rolled with the detour. Along those extra laps, we’d become a group figuring things out together. We had fun, even if I acquired more local soil than intended.

“The clock doesn’t matter when you see somebody at the event having a hard time,” Shaun told me during our interview. Friday’s sweepers had already made that attitude real. That gave me good reason to keep exploring.

A waypoint hunt with consequences

Saturday gave me time to reset. I covered the eXC start and finish, spending the race itself enjoying camp, catching up on chores, and getting my bike ready. Being rider, photographer, and the entire supporting production department keeps a guy occupied. Conversations with the Bosch representative and the Transition Bikes crew from Bellingham gave me time to enjoy the expo before heading back to the trails.

By afternoon, I was ready to trade camp chores for the Trailforks Adventure Challenge. The GPS scavenger hunt sent us looking for waypoints to punch our checkpoint cards. I teamed up with a camping neighbor, another first-timer from San Diego. Near our first target, around Jacks and the bottom of Pamplemousse,

we met another pair. Together, we decided to head for what we understood to be the toughest checkpoint to reach.

That meant Debeck’s Grind, a long, steep, loose fire road climb to the top of Debeck’s Hill. It was a good reminder of why I enjoy eMTBs. Assistance made the climb a possibility I could choose while leaving plenty for me to do. My battery was participating. So was the rest of me.

At the top, the Squamish Valley opened below us. We stopped, enjoyed the view, and cracked open a couple of beers. A few days earlier, none of these guys had been part of my weekend plans; now we were up here together, deciding what came next. The waypoint had given us a reason to climb. The place deserved more attention than a quick punch on a card.

Eventually, we had to choose a way down. Our route took us through Lofty Ambition, Rigs in Zen, and Crouching Squirrel Hidden Monkey. Near the top, steep rock rolls and demanding technical sections made it the hardest descent I had ever ridden. It was fun, intimidating, and occasionally an excellent opportunity to reconsider how casually we had selected our route.

Lower down, Crouching Squirrel Hidden Monkey began to feel closer to the flowing technical black-diamond riding I knew from home. Familiarity returned in pieces. I could recognize more of what the trail was asking, even while it continued to challenge me.

I had set out for a waypoint hunt with good company and come back with a gritty climb, a valley view, and a descent that changed my confidence. I wouldn’t confuse that with mastering Squamish. But the next time an unfamiliar trail makes me question myself, I have another experience to draw on.

Plenty happening beside the fire

That was the afternoon behind my decision to let the Night Ride go on without me. The main fire offered a chance to rest and get to know people. I stayed for conversation and recorded four interviews.

Among them was co-founder Andreas “Dre” Hestler, an Olympian and World Cup racer who’d gone on to travel journalism and events. He was also a dad with two kids. That put us on familiar ground; my racing résumé was considerably less likely to require its own filing cabinet.

Dre told me the gathering began when some eMTB riders felt shamed for their choice of bike. “Our premise was to bring that community together.” I’d already experienced that premise in the welcome at camp and the company on the trails.

When I asked about finding your place as a newcomer, he started with the conversation we were having. “But TC, I just met you. Now you’ve got one friendly face.” The North Shore guys who had welcomed me were his Wednesday night crew. The circle I’d worried about entering had been making room from the beginning.

I told him the Trailforks Challenge had royally kicked my ass, but it was rad. “You wouldn’t be a mountain biker if you didn’t like having your ass kicked!” he replied. Apparently, I had supplied further evidence that I belonged. My shoulder would have preferred a less rigorous admissions process.

I was curious whether other newcomers had found the same welcome. Samantha “Sam” Larick and her husband, Rich, had signed up just days before the event, encouraged by a promising forecast. Originally from Pennsylvania, they’d moved to Bellingham about a year earlier and had ridden in Squamish before.

Sam loved the mountains, huge trees, moss, and ferns. Yet her favorite part of the weekend was meeting people from different walks of life across Canada and the United States. When I asked about her experience as a woman at the event, she described encouragement from the women she’d met and from men of different ages. “You don’t feel like there are any differences between anybody as far as gender or ability, which makes it really nice,” she said.

Her advice was direct: “You can come alone, with friends, or with a partner.” I’d arrived with some reservations about the first option, so that landed close to home.

I’m primarily a solo rider at home; time alone on the bike helps me look after my mental health. Here, I was enjoying sharing that part of my life. Friendship can be hard to fit into an ordinary week, but between the rides and the fire, we’d had time to get to know one another. On Sunday, that willingness to help would change the riding itself.

Sunday with local eyes

After covering the eEnduro opening, I joined a guided ride with two women from Dialed In Cycling, both coaches and guides. We rode familiar pieces of the network before reaching Pamplemousse and Lower Pamplemousse, watching portions of the race and cheering riders along the way. With local knowledge leading us, I could concentrate on the trail.

Pamplemousse became my favorite trail of the weekend. One feature particularly sticks with me: a steep wooden bridge over a downhill rock garden, leading into a sharp right-hand turn with exposure. It was intimidating, but our guides were thoughtful and encouraging. Their coaching helped nearly all of us try it, and those who rode it were stoked.

The coaching brought to mind my conversation with Steve Phillips, a camp neighbor and first-timer from Encinitas, California. A BC Bike Race veteran and eMTB convert, he’d returned to BC to ride. Locals had shown him trails he would never have selected on his own, helping him explore at a level he felt comfortable with.

“I’m traveling around for a month, so I don’t want to get hurt. I’m in preservation mode!” he said. That was an approach I could appreciate. Steve came from surfing, where he had encountered secrecy around favorite spots. He valued mountain bikers eager to share their trails. A visitor could leave with more than directions.

The guides’ encouragement at the bridge made that generosity tangible. An eMTB can help you reach a trail; someone helping you understand what’s ahead can change how you feel about riding it. Dre had described his Wednesday crew adjusting assistance to share climbs. Technical skill still mattered on the descent, where our guides helped us make our own decisions with more confidence. The trail itself held another contribution worth recognizing. Pamplemousse was built by Ride BC and friends, by hand, over three years and roughly 3,400 hours. Knowing that gives the turns another dimens

to make it. By the time we returned for the closing gathering, there were plenty of people I wanted to thank.

A buckle and a reason to return.

After the riding came food, awards, and the belt buckle ceremony. Staff lined up so participants could thank them on the way to receiving their buckles. After the welcome at camp, Friday’s sweepers, and Sunday’s guides, I liked having that opportunity. The buckle gave me something to take home that wouldn’t require charging, downloading, or washing swamp out of it.

As I packed up, another part of my conversation with Steve came to mind. A BC Bike Race friend had invited him snowboarding in Switzerland; conversations at MegaVolt had persuaded him to add Pemberton to his trip. “All of this stuff just compounds,” he told me. We’d also talked about riding together at Tiger Mountain and Raging River back home. Those were possibilities I hadn’t driven north with.

As I headed south toward Seattle, the departures felt more like see-you-again-soons than goodbyes. My weekend had included a missed Hill Climb, an unscheduled swamp visit, and a descent that stretched my confidence. Now I had people to share those stories with. If you’ve been waiting for a friend to commit or for your riding to feel impressive enough, I understand the hesitation. I had some of it myself.

“You found your people here,” Dre told me. By departure, I knew what he meant. When I return, I suspect it will feel like a reunion for me, too.

Who might become a familiar face if you give yourself the chance to show up?

Considering MegaVolt

If you enjoy eMTBs, want to explore unfamiliar trails, and like the idea of a weekend with people who share that enthusiasm, MegaVolt deserves a look. Racers have plenty to chase, but my weekend shows how much there is to enjoy without competing. Guided and social rides offer other ways in. Talk with organizers about your experience and preferred level of challenge; Squamish’s technical terrain deserves respect, particularly when wet.

MTN Fun Basecamp provided camping, showers, charging, and direct trail access, with Dialed In Cycling on-site for rentals and mechanical help. Bring your charger and confirm power connections, accommodations, and meal inclusions. Arrange rentals ahead of time and ask about participant discounts. The organizers’ FAQs specify Class 1 pedal-assist eMTBs and a minimum participant age of 19. The organizers plan both 2027 events in Squamish, with the next gathering announced for spring. Check the official site for dates, registration, and the program for your chosen weekend.