Western Barren – New Nova Scotia Highpoint

Western Barren and White Hill Surveys

New Nova Scotia Highpoint

June 17-18, 2025

Results (CGVD2013 vertical datum)
Western Barren: 531.32m +/-0.03m
White Hill: 529.73m +/-0.03m
Western Barren is true highpoint of Nova Scotia

Results recognized by the peer-reviewed scientific journal Progress in Physical Geography (accepted for publication and will be online soon)

Until recently, White Hill was considered the highest peak in the Canadian Province of Nova Scotia. I climbed White Hill in July 2011 with Matthew via the Cheticamp Flowage route. This was my first of the Canada province/territory highpoints, and I completed climbing all the highpoints in 2019. I was the fifth person to complete the list, after Jack Bennett, Tom Bennett, Len Vanderstar, and Darrell Ainscough. There have been no more known completers of the list since 2019. Indeed, this is one of the more challenging peakbagging lists in the world, much more difficult than climbing all the US state highpoints.

In January 2024 Andrew Kirmse analyzed Lidar point cloud data of Nova Scotia and discovered that another peak, Western Barren, was measured 1-2m higher in this data set. The Lidar data was taken in 2015 for Western Barren and 2020 for White Hill. This data showed it was very likely, but not certain, that Western Barren is the true Nova Scotia highpoint.

I’ve discovered from past surveys that Lidar data can sometimes be in error by 1-2m in elevation if dense brush is misclassified as ground. In particular, this happened in Pennsylvania, where Lidar ground returns identified several new potential state highpoint candidates. But when I conducted ground surveys with dGPS units I found these candidates to be in error by 1-2m in elevation. Dense vegetation had been mis-classified on ground, and the candidate highpoints were in fact lower than the accepted state highpoint, Mt Davis.

Lidar measurements can also be in error if a sharp summit is missed by the Lidar measurement, since measurements are only taken at roughly 1-2m horizontal spacing and might not sample the true summit. I knew from my previous visit to White Hill that there is dense brush 1-2m high near the summit, and I assumed the brush might be similar on Western Barren, since it is only 55km away horizontal. Thus, both peaks were within error bounds of each other based on the Lidar measurements. The only way to know for certain which one was higher was to conduct ground surveys.

I have multiple differential GPS units capable of 2cm vertical accuracy, so I planned to visit both peaks to measure accurate elevations. I was extra motivated because I wanted to officially complete the highpoints of Canada list if Western Barren turned out to be higher. I neeed to wait until the snow melted off the summits to get accurate measurements, so I waited until mid June.

My plan was to survey each peak with two dGPS units for redundancy.  I would take 2-hour measurements to be sure to get down to 3cm vertical accuracy or better, and use 2.0m antenna rods with tripods to get the antennas above any brush and ensure accurate data.

There was some uncertainty in the Lidar data for exactly where the summit of Western Barren was. There exists two main methods to classify a return as ground – lastools and the default classification from the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC). For Western Barren these two locations were roughly 16m apart horizontal. I planned to mount one dGPS unit on the highest ground near the lastools point and one on the highest GSC ground return point. I would bring a 5x Abney level to determine the highest ground.

For White Hill I remembered the highest point was a rock outcrop. It appeared lastools and GSC highest ground returns found points about 5m horizontal away from the rock outcrop. I suspected these were likely dense brush being misclassified. If it was indeed ground, I would mount one unit on each point. If they were brush, as I suspected, I would mount one dGPS unit on the highest point of the rock outcrop, and the other on the GSC monument nearby. I could then use a tape measure to measure the height of the monument above the summit, so I could get two independent summit height measurements for corroboration.

On Monday night, just after the Seattle University commencement ceremony, I flew to Halifax, Nova Scotia. I started driving a rental Toyota Corolla at 3pm Tuesday headed towards Cape Breton. Based on the flight timing I planned to survey Western Barren first around sunset, then drive to Cheticamp Flowage and survey White Hill the next day.

I made good progress to Cape Breton Island, on schedule to get to Western Barren before sunset. There’s not much beta online about Western Barren, but based on satellite images it is only about 250m horizontal from a logging road, so I assumed it would be a quick bushwhack. All road approaches appeared to follow many miles of dirt roads, so I decided to trust the fastest route on google maps. This was a mistake.

I made it a bit past Big Intervale, but then the road deteriorated to an atv track, which was not followable in my low-clearance Corolla. So I backtracked and instead followed roads that looked wider on the satellite images. From Margaree Valley I followed Fielding Road to Highland Road, and this was in much better condition. It was dirt, but wide and well maintained with no problems for the Corolla. As I got closer to Western Barren I encountered more potholes, but it was still passable.

By 8:15pm I arrived at the road just east of Western Barren, and parked in a little dirt pullout. I packed both tripods and dGPS setups, switched into my bushwhacking outfit, and headed into the brush. The bushwhacking was easy, with tundra and big moss tussocks and some waist-high dense brush.

Within 10 minutes I reached the GSC highpoint coordinates. It was a big moss clump 1.1m above the highest ground nearby. I mounted the DA2 on the 2.0m tripod on the highest ground and started recording data. I then went to the highest point from lastools. This was 16m away horizontal and was a 1.5m tall clump of dense bushes. I mounted the Promark unit on the ground next to the bushes, and the antenna rod allowed me to get the antenna above to bushes for good satellite views.

I then went to the location of the highest return, which was a 2.0m tall tree between the other two measurements. As expected, the dense brush was adding significant error to the Lidar measurements, so Western Barren was not quite as tall as thought.

The sun was just setting and I got some nice sunset pictures. I hung out for two hours, then packed up and hiked back to the car by 11:30pm. I then drove about one hour to Cheticamp Flowage to get ready for White Hill. My original plan was to start at the pullout for the sluice gate, where I’d started in 2011. However, now there is a big red “Danger – No Trespassing” sign at that turnoff.

So I continued all the way to the dam on the west end of the reservoir, and found a pullout where people launch boats. I pulled over around 12:30am and slept in the car that night. I would have a bit longer approach parked 3km farther west on the lake, but at least I wouldn’t worry about getting in trouble.

Wednesday morning I started inflating my packraft but noticed the inflation valve stem had a crack in it! The seam had separated and couldn’t be fixed by standard boat patches. This was problematic since my plan hinged on being able to paddle across the lake.

I was able to patch it up somewhat with gorilla tape, but it still had a very slow leak. So I planned to hug the shore as much as possible. This was my first time combining surveying and packrafting, and the tripods fit solidly on the front strapped on horizontally, with the dGPS units stuffed inside in dry bags. I pushed off around 8am and hugged the southern shore of the lake.

After a few km I encountered a stiff south wind, and this seemed like an opportune time to cross the lake. The leak was slow enough I figured I could make it across. I topped off the air in the boat, then paddled hard due north. The tailwind helped me get across quickly. I then hugged the north shore, topped off the air again, and made one more short open crossing to my trailhead. The waves were quite large, 2ft at times with whitecaps, which made for an exciting crossing.

I deflated the packraft, rolled it up on shore, then packed up and started hiking. I recalled from 2011 there was an old abandoned fire road that started near the lake, and Matthew and I had been able to run this trail. We in fact were able to get a round trip time of 4 hours running along the side of the lake and this trail, then tagging the summit and returning. We had hustled on that trip since we’d started late and were trying to get back by sunset.

This time I had a lot more gear to haul up, and the trail was much more overgrown. I had plenty of daylight so there was no need to hustle. I eventually found the trail, which looked like it had turned into a moose-trail now. It was still followable, and I made good time.

There was one stretch in the middle that had been overtaken by slide alder and required a bit of dense bushwhacking. That was definitely new since 2011. But on the other side after 10 minutes the trail was in good shape again. When the trail hit its closes point to White Hill, just before White Hill Lake, I headed into the bushes and started bushwhacking directly towards the summit.

The brush wasn’t too bad, and soon turned into knee-high brush mixed with open terrain and moose trails. By 11:30am I reached the familiar summit, with the rock outcrop and the survey monument. This time there was a big moose antler nearby with “White Hill” scratched on it.

I first went to the lastools and highest return location, which were the same and were a 2.0m tall tree about 6m horizontal from the rock summit. The GSC highpoint was another dense bush. The rock outcrop was clearly the highest point. Like on Western Barren, dense brush had been misclassified as ground here.

I mounted the DA2 on the top of the highest point on the rock, and the promark on the top of the monument. I then started my two-hour measurement. Interestingly, I had cell phone service on the summit and was able to email myslef my Western Barren measurements so they were safely backed up. It briefly rained a few times, which was unexpected, but only lasted a few minutes. Luckily the dGPS units are nominally waterproof, though I prefer not to test that.

By 1:30pm I logged the data, packed up, and headed out. I bushwhacked out the same way, and made good time on the trail back to the lake by 4pm. This time when I inflated my packraft the leak was much faster. I couldn’t fix it any better with gorilla tape, and it didn’t make sense to try to paddle if I had to reinflate the boat every 5 minutes. So I instead decided to hike back around the lake.

I stayed on the shore on the east side and south side, and had an easy hike with no bushwhacking. Eventually I reached the sluice gate outflow, which is a 10m stretch of water that needs to be crossed. In 2011 I’d crossed at the sluice gate, but now it was covered in fencing and barbed wire. So I instead inflated the packraft, quickly paddled across before it lost air, then packed it back up.

I then hiked back out to the road and road – walked back to my car by 7pm for a 13 hour day. That evening I drove down to the southern tip of Cape Breton Island and found a good stealth campsite near Buckwheat Corner. Thursday morning I drove back to Halifax and dropped my car off in time for my afternoon flight out. Unfortunately my flight got cancelled due to thunderstorms in the NYC area, so I ended up spending a night in a hostel in town. Friday afternoon I made it out back to the US.

I processed my survey results with CSRS-PPP, the Canadian Spatial Reference System Precise Point Positioning service, and converted results to CGVD2013, the Canadian Vertical Geodetic Datum of 2013, the current standard in Canada.

The DA2 measured Western Barren 531.32m +/-0.03m and White Hill 529.73m +/-0.03m (95% confidence interval errors). The Promark measured the lastools location on Western Barren as 530.82m +/-0.03m. This was not the highest ground on Western Barren, so the DA2 location will be reported as the highest ground elevation.

On White Hill the monument was 0.25m above the highest ground. This was added to the Promark measurement to give a measured elevation of White Hill of 529.69m +/-0.06m. This elevation is consistent with the DA2 elevation with non-overlapping error bars. The DA2 had smaller errors, so the DA2 elevation will be the reported elevation for White Hill.

The final results are Western Barren 531.32m +/-0.03m and White Hill 529.73m +/-0.03m. This means Western Barren is 1.59m +/-0.06m taller than White Hill. Thus, Western Barren is the provincial highpoint of Nova Scotia.

For each peak, all three automated LiDAR processing methods misidentified the highest location and misclassified dense brush as ground. For Western Barren, Lastools identified a bush 20m horizontal from the highest ground as the summit, and the highest return was a different bush 10m horizontal from the highest ground. The highest ground return was 3m from the highest ground, but was also dense brush. Each of these returns was in error of 0.7m – 1.4m vertical from the highest ground.

For White Hill, all three automated LiDAR measurements also misclassified dense brush as ground. Lastools and the highest return method identified a bush 16m horizontal from the highest ground. The highest ground return identified a different bush also 16m horizontal from the highest ground. Vertical errors were 0.6-1.2m.

Ground measurements with dGNSS measured Western Barren is 1.59m taller than White Hill (Western Barren 531.32m, White Hill 529.73m CGVD2013 vertical datum). Thus, LiDAR correctly identified the provincial highpoint, but vertical errors in LiDAR measurements were comparable to the height difference between the peaks, meaning the LiDAR measurements alone were not definitive for which peak is higher.

 

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