Recently, after months away, I revisited Central Surrey. I was depressed by the sight of tent villages and by the recurrent sound of voices raised in anger, but charmed by the play that I went to, sated by the grocery-store salad that I had for dinner, and smitten by an addition to the cityscape: a tower, taller than any around it, its name at its top in neon: Civic Hotel. And with few lights lit, it appeared to be as yet untenanted. I had a happy feeling, cycling towards it, that I would get onto its roof.

The hotel appeared to be open for business. Entering, I climbed the stairs to the convention floor, rubbernecking at the decor like a tourist. (Which I was.) I passed some closed ballroom doors and paused before a door that boldly declared itself an emergency exit and warned me of the consequences of its use. I used it; nothing happened.

I was in a stairwell. I climbed.

A handwritten sign warned me that Stairwell A was closed between the fourth and seventh floors, and advised me to use Stairwell B. I seemed to be in Stairwell C, and so was unconcerned.

I climbed twenty-two flights, perhaps excluding a thirteenth (floors ending in fours were present and accounted for), and came to a solid door with a sign on it. The sign informed me that no public access to the rooftop patio was permitted. Nevertheless I pulled at that door. It was locked.

I went down a floor and, through an unremarkable hotel corridor, crossed over to Stairwell D. It too went no higher than the twenty-second floor, where it ended in an elevator lobby with three elevators, one locked glass door to the rooftop patio, and one locked bathroom door. (The women's. The symbol for woman was a circle atop a tall upright triangle -- something like an upside-down exclamation mark. I gazed at it blankly. Was it supposed to represent a keyhole? A vagina? (The circle the clitoris?) Then I understood: It was supposed to be a head atop a long dress.)

I seemed to be stuck, and seemed not to be in the tallest tower at all. I needed to find that Stairwell B!

I went back down a floor, against crossed over, and again climbed Stairwell C, seeing no other alternatives. I tried the door again, and took a look at its latch. The deadlatch was touching the plate, but there was a sizeable gap between the door and the frame, so perhaps it wasn't engaged. I looked in my wallet for a piece of plastic with which to try shimming the latch open. Finding nothing readymade, I folded an old phone card diagonally till it snapped in half. It seemed a highly unpromising tool for the task. But it worked.

I found myself outdoors on a patio, but not a rooftop: there was more tower overhead. Nonetheless I enjoyed the view, and some wine.

Looking south at Central City and SFU.

I found the men's room (I had been wondering where that was), which was not locked, and refilled my water bottle. (The symbol for man was a circle atop the same tall triangle, but upturned: presumably his head on his burly shoulders, dwindling to tiny feet.)

I crossed the patio and found myself outside the glass door to the elevator lobby, which I could pass through from this side. I went in, gently leaving the door unlatched behind me, just in case, and called an elevator -- which refused to deliver me to any floor higher than 3. So instead I reentered the stairwell and began the descent, crossing over to alternate stairwells every other floor at first, then less and less frequently, then again every floor below 8, in search of some other stairwell to take me back up.

I had no luck till 4, but there I suddenly found myself in a construction site that spanned a much wider space than the tower I had just been crossing back and forth through.

I entered new, not-quite-finished washrooms and locker rooms.

I went out on a balcony, where there was a small, filled swimming pool with dirt on its bottom, and a small unfilled jacuzzi, with none.

From here I could again see exactly where I wanted to go:

Through one window I looked across at the Skytrain station, which also appeared to be under construction. As I looked, I noticed someone was squeezing past a wooden barrier at the end of the platform, as if preparing to walk down the rails. The station seemed closed -- so I assumed I was looking at a fellow explorer! He saw me, and made some gesture. I waved. He gave me the finger. I gave him the thumbs up. He gave me the rock-and-roller's sign of the horns. I waved goodbye. I believe we parted friends.

I found myself in Stairwell A. I started climbing it.

Half a floor up, my way was completely blocked by some scaffolding. Oh yeah. I went in search of Stairwell B.

I found Stairwell B. I climbed it.

At every floor, a sign listed the dozen or so crossover floors, but also announced each and every floor to be a Crossover Floor. And, indeed, all the doors were open, every floor a crossover floor. The stairwell was dusty and cluttered with tools: obviously, this taller tower was still under construction. There could be little doubt that I was going to make it onto the roof.

I climbed fifty flights. I was dripping with sweat.

Aw, damn it.

The roof hatch to the very top was in fact locked, but, one flight down, I enjoyed fresh air and unobstructed views in several directions from the mechanical penthouse. In fact, I so enjoyed it that I forgot to take any pictures. So here's that one from the twenty-second floor again.

When at last I was ready to leave (my wine nearly finished), I went down a few floors to call an elevator. But the elevators would not be called.

So I got back in Stairwell B and climbed all the way back down.

On my way out, I passed through one of those conference rooms I'd passed when I had first arrived.

Waiting for my train at the station, I peeked around a wooden barrier at the end of the platform, and saw the empty, unfinished room I had waved from, an hour before.

One evening after a concert, before heading home, I scoped out a nearby condo under construction. To my surprised delight, the security fencing had a big welcoming gap in it, and the building had a big welcoming opening in one wall. I entered, found the stairwell, and climbed up twenty flights, the concert program still clutched in my hand.

Even a twenty-storey building feels pretty tall when it is the tallest thing around. Looking north towards downtown, with the junction of Main, Broadway, and Kingsway at my feet:
 

There were a dozen trees planted on the roof, obstructing the various views. Nevertheless it was a balmy night, and I drank it in.

"I am not a brave man at all, but a cautious, even timid soul who makes himself pull off one stunt after another for his own good. And I entered the lonely darkness thinking: Public space should not be like this; all the world ought to be mine. But how can I make it so?" (61)

"Every time I surrender, even necessarily, to authority which disregardingly or contemptuously violates me, so I violate myself. Every time I break an unnecessary law, doing so for my own joy and to the detriment of no other human being, so I regain myself, and become strong in the parts of me that the security man can never see." (97-8)

-- From William T. Vollmann's train-hopping memoir, Riding to Everywhere.

On a recent long weekend, I lackadaisically bicycled past some "Authorized Access Only" signs into this huge construction area.

There were a number of vehicles parked about, and a train shunting nearby, and some machinery humming away, so I expected at any minute to be called out to and sent packing. At lollygagging pace I circled the perimeter, getting gradually closer, before finally dropping my kickstand and wandering inside.

The place was deserted.

There was something magical about this location. First, it was huge. Second, it was vacant and unfinished, which made it feel like a brand-new ruin. The concrete floors were covered in the thinnest layer of rainwater. Wind ripped through the wooden walkways a dozen storeys above, causing tatters of plastic to flutter and flap.

Third, these silos were so smooth and simple -- big concrete cylinders -- that they felt more like alien or druidic monuments than serviceable structures. They were somehow at once reminiscent of cathedrals and of a streamlined video-game world.

I wondered vaguely about the differing orders in which they were being constructed -- some had columns in place for the funnel, but no roof, others had a roof but no columns -- but I didn't speculate for long. If I had had a tour guide, I would have listened attentively, but my enjoyment of these spaces had almost nothing to do with intellectual curiosity. The fun, as always for me, I suppose, was in trespassing, and in being inside a big strange thing I'd never seen before up close.

After the cylindrical ones, I ducked inside the tall cuboid one, half looking for a stairwell. (I was not about to climb sixteen flights of external scaffolding stairs in a high wind.) But these structures are not built to be climbed. In fact, the tall one didn't look like it was built to be entered by humans at all. In any case, its flooded gravel floor, littered with detritus from the construction going on sixteen storeys overhead, revealed that it had not been entered for some time.

I guess I speculated a little; but I learned nothing.

I got back on my bike and, grateful, gleeful, returned the way I'd come.

I continue to pop in to the West Burnaby Nonspecific Sickhouse when I'm in the neighborhood.

Doors that last time were unlocked are today locked; but sometimes a door that last time was locked is today unlocked.

This person liked horses.

Some bags of linen never made it out of this linen chute in the former health records department.

The calendar is from 2007.

Before I started exploring, my favorite dreams took place in big many-roomed houses or semi-derelict mansions. They were in fact exploring dreams.

Since I started exploring, I more often have infiltration dreams. Most commonly I am snooping around big hotels or construction sites or climbing office towers, avoiding running into people and trying doors to see if they are locked. Sometimes they are not!

I don't have recurring dreams, but I do, weirdly, have recurring dream-locations -- I could almost draw maps of some of them. In particular, there is a tower that I occasionally revisit, so high that it sways noticeably; another is a construction site that has, unearthed in its basement, some kind of portal to another world that I desperately want to get to.

Every time I go back to 'Rotown, I take a close look at the latest condo towers. The big development right now is Stn Sqr, which is eventually going to have five of them. Two are already up, and the taller one is the new tallest building around. Before going over to a friend's for dinner in the neighborhood, I compulsively checked out the fencing around this site.

To my surprised delight, I found that the solid chainlink wall had in one place been removed to give access to a firefighters' standpipe. This dark little alcove, imposingly barricaded by a strip of red caution tape, was enclosed by temporary fencing, connected at one corner by a bit of twisted wire and another by nothing but another strip of caution tape. This I ripped, then went to my friend's for dinner, looking forward to a postprandial explore.

When, four hours later, I returned, the tape had been replaced! This briefly gave me pause; but I had had two glasses of wine with dinner, so I ripped this tape too and slipped inside. 

I found a stairwell which took me only to the third floor, then another which took me up one more, to a rooftop garden shared by the two towers. I circled the taller building, trying a few locked doors before finding one wide open. I went inside, found the stairwell, and climbed to the 56th minus 6 (no numbers ending in 4) = the 50th floor to the lower roof; a climb up a ladder and out a hatch brought me to the upper roof. 

Looking down on 'Rotown Mall.

Looking south toward the shimmering lights of Richmond.

Looking down on Crystal Mall. My old friend, Element Hotel, now looking paltry on the right.

It was a warm night and the view was scintillating. I tried my best to drink it in, but I was tired and my thoughts wandered. It crossed my mind that perhaps I enjoy the idea of topping roofs, the satisfaction and pride of having topped roofs, rather more than the actuality. Also, I had to shit; so I took a dump in the highest portable toilet in Burnaby, reflecting with pride and satisfaction that they'd need a sixty-story crane to dispose of my DNA. 

I climbed back down, exiting perhaps forty-five minutes after entering. The tape had not been repaired, but while getting on my bicycle, I did see a security guard shambling around the perimeter towards my point of entry. Perhaps my timing had been good. 

The new development at Bwood is starting to look pretty good, so on a recent holiday I decided to check it out. 

Sort of amazingly, I was able to get access into the construction site from an unlocked door in the mall's service corridors.

From the street I had seen one security guard patrolling the perimeter. I didn't see him inside, but I didn't rove much. I got my bearings and made a beeline for the big condo tower.

I trudged up approximately fifty flights of stairs, then the stairs ended. I climbed two more flights of rickety scaffold stairs in the elevator shaft, but couldn't nerve myself to climb the last big section onto the "roof".

The views were tremendous, the sun was just setting, I could see all of Greater Vancouver and beyond.

I retraced my steps and, exiting the site and the mall, reassumed my law-abiding anonymity. But secretly I felt like hot shit.