Into the Woods Dark and Deep

The North Shore of Vancouver isn’t always foggy, wet, and dripping, but it might as well be. With nearly one hundred inches of precipitation per year, a ready supply of moisture from Burrard Inlet, and mountains like Seymour and Cypress creating their own weather, the Shore is a catchall that puts the rain in “rain forest.” And that makes local photographer Sterling Lorence quite happy.

Lorence, forty-eight, grew up on the Shore, rode BMX bikes before there were mountain bikes, switched to mountain bikes when they became available, and has captured every stage of the radical North Shore riding scene, from the earliest days of elevated stunts to the melodic syncopation of today’s flow trails. What he loves most of all? The wet.

“I was influenced by being in those mountains at an early age,” he said. “Knowing what it’s like when the sun is out, what it’s like when it’s pouring, what it’s like when it’s foggy. I was the guy who