Aldergrove Regional Park is located between Langley and Abbotsford near the Aldergrove American border crossing. It used to be an open-pit gravel mine that was restored into the Aldergrove Bowl.
The 6.5km “Rock ‘n Horse Trail” is a mixed use trail shared between hikers, horses, and cyclists. It’s well maintained with gravel, and it rolls through small hills and descents just exciting enough for a young cyclist. As a horse trail, it’s littered with horse manure but it’s fairly easy to spot them and cycle around them.
I brought Big Bro and Middle Bro to warm up their biking legs for the season.
The views featured in this park were mostly small hills and meadows. As the surrounding area is fairly flat, some viewpoints did allow for more expansive views.
“The Big Rock” on the eastern edge of the park is evidence of glacier activity in the area from the last Ice Age.
Some steeper sections required our young bikers to walk their bikes up, and allowed them to zoom downhill on the other side.
The most unique part of our loop was the section on the western edge of Aldergrove Bowl. This section features more open views of the bowl and some beautiful spring flowers.
A seasonally, 1.4km mowed trail was open on the meadow. A pleasant unmarked surprise that we took on right away.
This was like riding on large pastures. The mowed ‘trail’ were somehow a shade darker than the rest of the grassy field, so it’s easy to follow. This was definitely a riding experience we’ve never had before. Middle Bro kept talking about ‘follow the green!’ long after we went home.
Big Bro was of course a champ again today. But at 5 years old, Middle Bro not only handled the up and downhills like a boss, he basically kept up with the group the whole way. He did not have a single word of complaint even as he started to get tired. No snack bribes, no sticker rewards, no bargaining. Just good weather, good bikes, and good company to keep these two going.
I highly recommend this short but sweet biking trail in the spring and summer when the mowed loop is open. It’s short enough for an intermediate young cyclist who like a little bit of excitement from hills, but some sections would require them to get off and hike the bikes up. A good handle on proper braking especially going downhill is required. Please note that only the Rock ‘n Horse Trail and the connecting trail to the parking lot in Aldergrove Bowl are open to cycling.
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