Before the Kettle Valley Railway was built between  1910 and 1916, there were older trails and routes to the Interior used by First Nations, fur traders, explorers, and gold seekers.    From Hope one of the routes went up the Coquihalla River, but there was one difficult area right where the Othello Tunnels were later added, so mule trains and pack horses followed a trail built by the Hudson Bay Company in 1860.   The trail from Hope came along a bench above the river (the current Trans Canada Trail) then climbed over a low pass between two hills and down to the riverside near where the the Othello Road now is.

This was a step along the route to the Nicola Valley (linking Fort Okanagan and Fort Kamloops.   The trail went a short way upstream to a ford then crossed the river and climbed a low hill over to the north side of Nicolum Creek to the headwaters area of the Skagit River.   We have also hiked the Hope Pass Trail which  that goes up the Skaist River,  a wilderness route over the Cascades.

In the Coquihalla/Othello area, we hiked the 3.5 km trail that starts and ends on the TransCanada Trail/KVR.    By hiking the Othello Tunnels route plus the Hope-Nicola Trail, we can complete a 5.7 km loop.

The trail is now within the Coquihalla Canyon Provincial Park and was in good shape with adequate signage.

On the south side of the hill on a smoky day, we had some good views of 6026 foot Hope Mountain.

The trail climbs 288m (944 feet) over the pass between the two unnamed hills.

At the top is an old camp spot with a plaque commemorating the Engineers’ Mule Road of 1860.

We went down the hill to the parking lot for the Othello Tunnels, a 5.7 km hike in Coquihalla Canyon Provincial Park.