Mount Calder

September 10, 2026

Mount Calder

Mount Calder - 1469M

1235M Prominence

49.88648, -123.98868

September 10, 2026

9H 45M C2C, 9H 10M Moving

1680M Ascent and descent

32.5KM (20 KM Paddle)

Mount Calder has been on my mind for a while now. Not because it is particularly interesting or jaw dropping peak, but more so because I have been staring at it on maps and from the Sunshine Coast ferry for way too long. Interestingly, and despite most probably not knowing this peak, Mount Calder is one of the 5 peaks of 1000 meters of prominence or more in the Qathet region, along with Slide Mountain, Mount Alfred, Goat Island Peak (which I have all climbed) and Mount Denman. I saw one good day in the September forecast, and with flexible work schedule, I made the call, loaded the kayak, and packed up at 8:30PM the night before. The next morning I got a 6AM start from town and drove Lois main all the way South. Lois main is in good condition at the moment. I then turned off on the St Vincent Bay FSR, which is still in good condition. I opted to explore a spur which would have taken me to a launch site further north, but it was too deteriorated to drive, so I turned around and headed back to an FSR on Elephant point. This FSR was in much better condition, and it brought me reasonably close to the water after crossing 2 fairly deep cross ditches. I was still unfortunately about 200M from the shore, and all that was there was an overgrown old road/trail. I unloaded the kayak and began the miserable portage with my kayak wheels, and the 200M of distance ended up taking me a good 20 minutes or so. The trail took me down to a small bay with a rocky beach and I was able to launch easily. I paddled to the point north to a point before traversing Hotham Sound towards Syren point on the peninsula. From Syren point I paddled further north to the forestry barge unloading area and this is where I left the kayak. After pulling my boat ashore I quickly began hiking up the forestry road as the hours of the day were already starting to escape me with all the driving, portaging and general kayak faff. The road was not overgrown and I followed it to a deactivated creek crossing, before realizing that I took a wrong turn and had actually intended to try and continue up a different FSR to a cut block further up the mountain. I turned around and went to this FSR only to find it completely grown over in a nasty way, so I ended up just hiking back to the FSR with the deactivated creek crossing I had hiked to earlier by accident. I continued up this FSR after the creek, and this took me to another, even larger deactivated creek crossing. At this point I crossed began the bushwhack, and hiked into the forest. I soon crossed the gorgeous little creek and began finding my way to the ridge I would climb. The forest was quite dense with ferns until I made it past the edge of the old cut block I was hiking along side at first, but became much more reasonable soon after. I battled my way up the forest for the next 2 hours, following many game trails and moving as quickly as possible. I had to bypass several bluffy sections by hiking around them. As I got higher I opted to scramble up a few of these more bluffy sections, as moving around them looked less likely. There were a few class 3 sections, that needed some attention due to the wet and mossy nature of the rock. The whole morning was soaking wet, and by the time I hade it up to the sub alpine and got my first views of the summit, I was drenched. Despite the summit being barely in the sub alpine, some rewarding views were still seen. I followed the ridge up the rocks and shrubby forest up and over a small sub summit bump, then back down into a notch and up the final slope to the summit. The summit ridge was enjoyable and there were a fair few tarns. I hiked further North to what I thought might be the true summit, but then soon came back to the true summit with the survey marker, and took a break. No sign of any previous ascents were on the summit, not even a cairn or a displaced rock. I waited a while on the summit in hopes that views to the east would clear up a bit more, but I had to settle with views of the craggy bluffs in Hotham Sound, views of Walt Ridge, and the odd view of the summits in the Marlborough heights area. After airing out my feet for a while and eating a sandwich, I decided to head back down. The descent was rapid. I was lowering myself off of blueberry bushes and scrawny cedar trees faster than I ever have before, and hopping my way down the mossy steep forest sections when I wasn't already accidently slipping my way down. I managed to follow my ascent route fairly closely to avoid the bluffy sections, as it has worked pretty flawlessly on the ascent. Just before getting back to the deactivated FSR, close to the creek crossing, I spotted a magical 50 meter waterfall and pool, so decided to take another decent break and take in the spectacular spot. After taking a dip I packed up and continued down to the FSR and then back to the Kayak. The tide had risen but the winds were still pushing north into the sound just like they had been earlier in the morning, but a little stronger. I decided to make the shortest traverse across the sound as possible and headed straight West to the shore, and then continued along the shore until my launch site at Elephant point from earlier in the morning. The paddle back was a little tiring as I was paddling into the wind for an hour and a half, but steady paddling paid off, and I was back at the crux of the day, the boat bushwhack before I knew it. Dragging the kayak back up the overgrown road back to the truck was just as bad as I remembered it, but now only more difficult with gravity working against me. Eventually I made it back to the truck, still sub 10 hours, and the sun finally started to set by the time I got back to town. Overall, I would never recommend this peak to anyone looking for a local hike, but It was cool to make an ascent of a seldom climbed peak with zero beta, no pictures, and solely some very outdated 3D satellite images.