Redwall Peak

Redwall Peak - 1394M

48M Prominence

49.15213, -125.37211

August 15, 2026

12H 37M C2C, 12H Moving

1370M Ascent and descent

15.5KM

Redwall Peak is not a typical peakbagger's peak, as it lacks prominence and requires quite a bit of effort for such a low lying peak. It is strictly a climber's peak, and the easiest route goes at low 5th class on the south east side. The North West ridge of the peak offers the most commonly ascended route, that goes at 5.6. Wanting to try something a bit longer and more difficult, Stella and I opted for the seldom climbed North Face. The Island Alpine book shows this route as being 425M and 8 pitches of climbing, but our results were a little different. The day started at around 6:30 when we began the hike from the FSR pullout right at the highway. We hiked up the road for a few minutes, then ran into the hydro gate. The road was quite steep and a bit of a slog, but the progress was quick and we made it to the dam after roughly one hour. This road would be much better traveled with a bike, and next time I will be sure to push a bike up for the descent, as the road is in immaculate shape. Once at the dam, we found the trail and followed it for a few minutes before crossing the creek. There is a log to cross the creek on, but it was almost dry anyway. From this point there is a steep 500 meter push up the forest into the sub alpine. This trail shocked us both as it was a really great trail, and we were prepared for a bushwhack. The steep trail took us up to the ridge, where the trees thinned out and a bit more attentiveness was required to make our way up the ridge a little further. We soon left the trail and began a descent into the north bowl of the Mackenzie range. Surprisingly, we found a flagged route, and the descent was quick with a  bit of steep shrub downclimbing. Once in the bowl an enjoyable little hike took us to the big tarn at the base of Redwall. We stopped to have a bite to eat before comencing the scramble to the base of the climb. The first 100 meters of the 425M route is a scramble up to a snow patch where the route actually begins. We opted to go left and found some slabs to scramble up that led to a steep walled gulley. Above the gulley was the start of the climb, but to exit the gulley a few low 5th moves were definitely required. Right as we got to the base of the North Face and began gearing up and analyzing the options to determine what the true start of our climb really was, it began to sprinkle some rain. Thankfully the clouds did not look too threatening and the drizzle soon stopped. With the warm temps drying up the rock immediately we began the climb. Stella led pitch 1 which started with a low angle dihedral that took gear once it steepened up. She continued on the pitch straight up, but she was unable to find what the book described. After around 60 meters of climbing in the 5.9 range, no belay station was obvious, so she made a tricky 10 meter traverse to the left and found a small shrub and a descent little crack to plug a few pieces into. I then followed her up the cryptic pitch and geared up for my lead. Pitch 2 was a pretty clean 60 meter-ish line up some interesting slopey jugs, that somehow took pretty good gear. I topped out the pitch at the base of the treed ledge and slung one of the two tree stumps after traversing a slight bit to the right. Stella then followed up to the broad bushy ledge. I belayed her up 20 or so meters and she pulled her way up the bushes up and to the right to a tight corner with a tree. She continued on the lead up another fairly meandering and cryptic pitch on good rock with less than ideal gear. I geared up to lead the final pitch which was the most shrubby of the rock pitches. With careful rope navigation it was still a good pitch though. Some mixed terrain took me through a fun orange dihedral. After a bit more mixed terrain I was on a final choss pile that made up the summit. Just below the summit I found some fractured boulders to plug a few cams into, and extended my anchor back over the the edge of the face. Stella followed up and we were careful to manage the rope in order to not release the choss onto her. The chossy summit was pretty neat, with more sweet views of the Mackenzie range, and the clouds filling in the valley bottoms. We didn't linger around for too long, and I soon spotted some rappel tat towards Mackenzie peak. We scrambled over to it, then decided that with at least 2 of the 3 anchor boulders being loose we would find a different way down. We backtracked to the grippy slabs and found a more reliable chockstone anchor in a crack. We rappelled down to another slightly questionable anchor off a rotting tree and a large slung boulder. The overhanging second rappel brought us down to a slippery ledge covered in scree with another large slung boulder. This final rappel brought us a full 35 meters down to more even ground, where we were able to scramble left down to the hike out. After hiking around the west side of the peak we were able to get back up onto the sub alpine north ridge and then scramble and hike back to the point we had turned off to descend into the bowl earlier in the morning. We then cruised down the steep trail and the logging road and made it back to the car with some daylight to spare. We drove back into Port Alberni to approach the following day's climb on Mount Arrowsmith.

Road is gated

Trail is steep

The full Mackenzie range comes into view, Redwall is the rightmost peak, and this is the North 
Face

Approaching Redwall North Face. Photo Stella Mazurek

Stella scrambling up to the base of the climb

Stella leading pitch 1

Looking down on pitch 2

Stella nearing the end of pitch 2

Looking across the North face towards Canoe, Triple Peaks, and other spires of the Mackenzie
 range (L>R) from the treed ledge at the base of pitch 3. 

Looking down the orange dihedral on pitch 4

Stella topping out the final pitch onto the summit

Redwall Peak summit

Redwall summit register

The Mackenzie Range. Poncho Peak, The Centaur, Flat Top, The Shadowblade, Mackenzie Peak 
(L>R)

The Cat's Ears, Canoe Peak, Triple Peak (L>R)

Rappel station 1

Rappel station 2

Stella on the overhanging rappel 2

Rappel station 3

Making our way back to the ridge

Returning to the ridge, Redwall North West ridge in background

One last look at the range

Hiking back down the ridge

Descending into the clouds in the Canoe Creek valley. Cat's Ears (Left) and Canoe Peak

Redwall Peak route