Mount Waddington, standing at 4,019 metres (13,189 ft.), is the highest peak entirely within B.C.’s Coast Mountains, a remote range known for its rugged terrain, vast glaciers, and unpredictable weather. Often dubbed “Mystery Mountain” in its early days, Waddington’s history is about exploration, perseverance, and tragedy, marked by the challenges of its inaccessibility and technical difficulty.
Waddington’s known climbing history is a story steeped in uncertainty. In 1925, Don and Phyllis Munday, a renowned Canadian mountaineering couple, spotted a distant, glacier-clad peak from Mount Arrowsmith on Vancouver Island. Whether they saw Waddington itself is debated, as Don Munday noted the sighting was unlikely, but their observation sparked curiosity about the Waddington Range, a region then uncharted on maps. The Mundays, with over 150 summits and 40 first ascents to their…
