Hector was appointed surgeon and geologist to the Palliser expedition[ 1857-1860] and was sent to explore the western parts of British North America. Hector made many important observations regarding the geology and ethnology of the Canadian West and Rocky Mountains, including an exploration along the Athabasca River from Fort Edmonton to Athabasca Pass in 1859

He returned by Rocky Mountain House and thence back to Edmonton along the route already familiar to him, arriving just in time for the Christmas and New Year festivities, which included a most successful ball given by Mrs. Christie and Palliser.

At once, after this had gone, Hector went away again with dog-sleds to the northwest. He followed the old Company trail to Fort Assiniboine on the Athabasca River, up that river to Jasper House, on past the mouth of the Miette River, which led to the Yellowhead Pass across the mountains to the Fraser, and on, again, past the mouth of the Whirlpool River. He had hoped to go up this river to the Athabasca Pass, which the Expedition’s instructions had set as the northerly limit of the country to be explored. His guide went lame, so he was forced to content himself with studying the pass from a high vantage-point, from which he thought he could easily identify Mounts Hooker and Brown, on either side of it [1].

Dr. Hector was a tireless worker. His capacity for endurance in any kind of weather was the talk of men around camp. He had four horses to his string and they were not too many for his demands. There was no let up in his persistence, as day after day, all except Sunday, he continued his unending labours to cover as wide a range of territory as possible [2]

He was appointed geologist to the provincial government of Otago, New Zealand, in 1861 and director of the Geological Survey of New Zealand from 1865-1903. He returned to Canada in 1904 to visit some of his previous exploration grounds.