Bus service offers ticket to ride to Sea-to-Sky parks

It's a hot summer weekend. You're itching to make your great escape from the concrete jungle into the world-class wilderness north of Vancouver.

You hop in your car (or maybe your friend's car) and drive up to Stawamus Chief, only to get trapped in an agonizing parking lot quagmire.

On the way back, you're inching along the Sea-to-Sky Highway in bumper-to-bumper traffic wondering if it was worth it.

It's the stuff of Vancouver nightmares, but an Ontario-based non-profit says it might have the remedy.

Parkbus is a new direct bus service from Vancouver to four popular provincial destinations on the Sea-to-Sky corridor.

For $44 per adult, the bus will take passengers from the city to one of four destinations Stawamus Chief, Shannon Falls, Alice Lake, and Garibaldi Park. At the end of your day, it'll pick you up and return you home.

A runaway success ... so far

The catch? Well, it's a pilot project that only runs until September 11, and all the trips are sold out and the wait list has 50 people.

But Alex Beryland, one of the co-founders of the project, says there's a pretty good chance the service will come back next season.

Beryland, speaking with Stephen Quinn on CBC's The Early Edition, started the service after struggling to get to parks near the city.

"Before this existed, I had to rely on family or friends or hitchhiking. Instead of doing that, we figured a lot of other people probably have the same issue and we wanted to give it a shot."

Parkbus is not a bus operator, Beryland explained, but partners with a bus company and other organizations to facilitate the trips.

In Ontario it already services 16 different destinations, including overnight and day trips.

Here in B.C., it is partnered with B.C. Parks, Mountain Equipment Co-op, and Better Environmentally Sound Transportation.

Beryland is looking for more partners who he hopes will lend their support for a permanent service.

"Part of being here in this country is to see these places and see them as our own. That makes people preserve them and take care of them better."

With files from The Early Edition

To listen to the interview, click on the link labelled New Sea-to-Sky bus service launches