Coral Ridge
David Thompson Highway
July 20, 2008

Although I find it hard to say anything good about Coral Ridge I am prejudiced by the poor route description found in the David Thompson Highway: A Hiking Guide. We had no trouble following the horse trail as described, but after leaving it and ascending the ledges, the instructions made no sense. Here one is required to “drift left,” and this is repeated three times. Such an instruction is utterly useless when you are bushwhacking for the better part of an hour. Instead, a compass bearing or a waypoint would have been imperative.

Somehow going left didn't seem right so we drifted right. As it turns out, my instincts were correct: we should have strayed well right. When we climbed high enough to see above the trees to view the ridge, we saw a scree slope topped by steep slabs. We had to work our way right to avoid the slabs in order to gain the ridge. The simple map in the book (which we didn't photocopy because it appeared a couple pages before the text) does show the route going right. Another glaring error is portraying the wrong elevation and elevation gain – off by 200 m – which can be determined by looking at the NTS map. The summit GR should have been added since this ridge is not named on the any map I found.

When the trees don't obscure the view, Abraham Lake from the ridge is impressive. We spent an hour and a half on the summit ridge before heading down. Instead of retracing our steps we descended a steep slab and scree slope below the summit. Possibly this is the "avalanche slope" that the authors refer to that one would reach by drifting left, although contrary to the route on their map. It would take luck to reach it by bushwhacking.

Although the views were fine on Coral Ridge, I think for a little added effort, it may be better to ascend the nearby south end of Mount Stelfox instead. The higher point which is well above the treeline would trump any views seen from Coral Ridge.