50 Fun Facts About Geography Trivia for Seniors

Which river is generally listed as the longest in the world, at about 6,650 kilometres?

The Nile runs about 6,650 km from the Lake Victoria basin to the Mediterranean; the Amazon carries far more water and, by some measurements, rivals it for length.

Which two men made the first documented ascent of Mount Everest in 1953?

Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary reached the summit on 29 May 1953 by the Southeast Ridge as part of John Hunt's British expedition; Hillary was a New Zealand beekeeper, Tenzing a Sherpa mountaineer.

What is the world's largest hot desert?

The Sahara covers about 9.2 million square kilometres across North Africa; only the cold deserts of Antarctica and the Arctic are larger overall.

Which city was chosen as Australia's capital as a compromise between Sydney and Melbourne?

Canberra was purpose-built after federation in 1901, with construction from 1913, and sits in the Australian Capital Territory, an enclave within New South Wales.

Which is the smallest sovereign state in the world by both area and population?

Vatican City covers about 44 hectares (109 acres) with roughly 800 residents; it was created as a sovereign state by the 1929 Lateran Treaty with Italy.

Greenland, the world's largest island, belongs to which kingdom?

It is an autonomous territory and its people are Danish citizens. The kingdom's other parts are Denmark proper and the Faroe Islands.

In what year did the Panama Canal open?

1914: the canal opened on 15 August 1914 after the United States took over the failed French project in 1904; Panama assumed full control at the end of 1999.

Which US president signed the 1977 treaties that eventually handed the Panama Canal to Panama?

Jimmy Carter signed the Torrijos-Carter Treaties with Panama's Omar Torrijos on 7 September 1977; the US Senate ratified them in 1978 by 68 votes to 32, one more than the two-thirds required.

Which Egyptian leader nationalised the Suez Canal in 1956, sparking the Suez Crisis?

Gamal Abdel Nasser announced the nationalisation on 26 July 1956 to fund the Aswan High Dam, prompting the Israeli, British and French invasion that autumn; the crisis ended with a humiliating Anglo-French withdrawal.

In what year did East Germany begin building the Berlin Wall?

1961: East German forces sealed the border and began building the Wall on 13 August 1961; it stood for 28 years before the border opened.

On what date did East Germany announce its citizens could freely cross into West Berlin?

9 November 1989: that evening East Berlin's Günter Schabowski announced the new travel rules at a press conference, and crowds forced the crossings open within hours; Germany reunited on 3 October 1990.

Route 66 ran from Chicago to which California city?

Santa Monica: Route 66 covered 2,448 miles through eight states from Chicago to the Pacific at Santa Monica; it was decommissioned in 1985, and Steinbeck called it the Mother Road.

Which of the five Great Lakes is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface area?

Lake Superior spans about 82,100 square kilometres, the largest freshwater surface area on Earth; Michigan and Huron are technically one body of water joined at the Straits of Mackinac.

The Mississippi River traditionally rises from which body of water in northern Minnesota?

From there it flows 2,340 miles to the Gulf of Mexico. Only the Missouri is longer among American rivers.

The United States bought Alaska from Russia in 1867 for how much?

$7.2 million, roughly two cents an acre: Secretary of State William Seward negotiated the purchase from Russia, signed on 30 March 1867, and critics mocked it as 'Seward's Folly'.

Which was the last state to join the United States, in August 1959?

Hawaii became the 50th state on 21 August 1959; it had been a kingdom until 1893 and a US territory from 1898, and Alaska had joined seven months earlier.

Which sculptor carved Mount Rushmore, working from 1927 to 1941?

Gutzon Borglum led the carving from 1927 until his death in March 1941, and his son Lincoln finished the work that October; the Lakota name for the mountain means Six Grandfathers.

Which river carved the Grand Canyon?

The Colorado River cut the Grand Canyon over millions of years; the canyon is 277 miles long, up to 18 miles wide and over a mile deep.

Which of the three Niagara waterfalls straddles the Canada-US border?

Horseshoe Falls, the largest of the three, straddles the border between Ontario and New York; the American and Bridal Veil falls lie entirely in the United States.

Sri Lanka was known by what name before 1972?

Ceylon: the island gained independence from Britain in 1948 and became the Republic of Sri Lanka in 1972; its tea industry kept the Ceylon name as a brand.

Which country was officially called Burma in English until 1989?

Myanmar: the military government changed the English name from Burma in June 1989; many governments and news organisations kept using Burma for years afterwards.

Southern Rhodesia became which independent nation on 18 April 1980?

Zimbabwe gained independence on 18 April 1980 under Robert Mugabe, and its capital Salisbury was renamed Harare in 1982; the colony had been named after Cecil Rhodes in the 1890s.

Which country was historically known to the West as Persia?

Iran: the government asked foreign countries to use 'Iran' rather than Persia from 1935; it borders seven countries plus the Caspian Sea, the Gulf of Oman and the Persian Gulf.

Which Southeast Asian country was never colonised by a European power?

Thailand, then Siam, gave up territory and trade rights through unequal treaties but stayed independent as a buffer between British Burma and French Indochina.

Which Indian city was officially called Bombay until 1995?

Mumbai: the city's seven islands passed to England in 1661 as part of Catherine of Braganza's dowry on marrying Charles II, and the state renamed Bombay as Mumbai in 1995.

Which Chinese city was long spelled Peking in the West?

Beijing: the Peking spelling came from older romanisation systems; the pinyin form Beijing became standard abroad from the 1980s, and the city's sites include the Forbidden City and the Temple of Heaven.

Vietnam's largest city, formerly Saigon, was renamed in 1976 after whom?

Ho Chi Minh: Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City in 1976 after the reunification of Vietnam, honouring the late revolutionary leader; the river through the city kept the Saigon name.

Which Russian city was called Petrograd, then Leningrad, before getting its original name back?

Saint Petersburg was Petrograd from 1914, Leningrad from Lenin's death in 1924, and regained its original name by referendum in 1991; it endured the 872-day siege of 1941–44.

On what date was the Soviet Union formally dissolved?

26 December 1991: the Soviet of the Republics voted the USSR out of existence the day after Gorbachev resigned as president; glasnost and perestroika had loosened the system, and nationalism did the rest.

Czechoslovakia peacefully split into the Czech Republic and Slovakia in which year?

1993: the federal parliament voted to dissolve Czechoslovakia in late 1992, and the Czech Republic and Slovakia came into being on 1 January 1993, in what is called the Velvet Divorce.

The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia formally ceased to exist in which year?

1992: after Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia and Bosnia seceded in 1991–92, Serbia and Montenegro proclaimed a new federal republic on 27 April 1992, ending the socialist federation Tito had held together since 1945.

Which is the longest river in Europe?

The Volga runs about 3,530 km through central and southern Russia into the Caspian Sea, making it both Europe's longest river and the world's longest that never reaches an ocean.

The Danube rises in southern Germany and empties into which sea?

The Black Sea: the Danube, Europe's second-longest river, runs about 2,850 km from Donaueschingen in the Black Forest to a delta on Romania's Black Sea coast.

Which is the largest and deepest of the world's oceans?

The Pacific covers about 46 percent of Earth's water surface, more than all the land put together, and holds the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench at nearly 11 kilometres down.

The shores of which salt lake are the lowest land on Earth, more than 430 metres below sea level?

The Dead Sea's shores lie about 430 metres below sea level and keep dropping as the lake shrinks; it is fed by the River Jordan and bordered by Jordan, Israel and the West Bank.

The Great Barrier Reef lies off the coast of which Australian state?

Queensland: the reef runs more than 2,300 kilometres along the state's coast, with over 2,900 individual reefs and 900 islands, making it the world's largest coral reef system.

Timbuktu, a byword for somewhere remote, is a real city in which country?

Mali: Timbuktu sits about 20 kilometres north of the Niger River on the southern edge of the Sahara, and was a centre of Islamic scholarship and the gold-salt trade in the 15th and 16th centuries.

Kilimanjaro, Africa's highest mountain, is in which country?

Tanzania: Kilimanjaro rises near the Kenyan border in the country's northeast; a dormant volcano at 5,895 metres, it is the highest free-standing mountain in the world.

Which explorer was first to reach the geographic South Pole, in December 1911?

Roald Amundsen's Norwegian party reached the South Pole on 14 December 1911, five weeks before Robert Falcon Scott's British team, which died on the return journey.

Britain handed Hong Kong back to China at midnight on which date?

1 July 1997: sovereignty passed at midnight as the 99-year lease on the New Territories, signed in 1898, expired; Britain had held Hong Kong Island itself outright since 1842.

In what year did the Golden Gate Bridge open?

1937: the bridge opened to pedestrians on 27 May 1937 and to cars the next day; its 1,280-metre main span was the world's longest until the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge opened in 1964.

Which is the longest continental mountain range in the world?

It runs the whole western edge of South America. Its highest peak, Aconcagua in Argentina, is about 6,961 metres.

Which South American country has Quito as its capital?

Ecuador: Quito, at about 2,850 metres, is its capital, while Guayaquil is its largest city; the country, named for the equator that crosses it, also owns the Galápagos Islands.

Which lake is the world's deepest and holds more fresh water than all the Great Lakes?

Lake Baikal reaches 1,642 metres deep and holds about 22 to 23 percent of the world's fresh surface water, more than all five Great Lakes combined.

Angel Falls, the world's tallest uninterrupted waterfall, is in which country?

Venezuela: Angel Falls drops 979 metres from Auyán-tepui in Canaima National Park, with an uninterrupted plunge of 807 metres; its Pemon name is Kerepakupai Merú.

Which mountain range forms the conventional boundary between Europe and Asia in Russia?

The Urals run about 2,500 km from the Arctic coast to Kazakhstan and separate European Russia from Siberia; the Trans-Siberian Railway crosses them on its 9,289 km run from Moscow to Vladivostok.

The Statue of Liberty was a gift to the United States from the people of which country?

France: the statue was a gift from the French people, designed by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi with a framework by Gustave Eiffel, and was dedicated on 28 October 1886.

In which year did the Suez Canal officially open?

1869: the canal opened on 17 November 1869 after ten years of construction driven by French diplomat Ferdinand de Lesseps, linking the Mediterranean and the Red Sea.

Mount Everest's summit sits on the border between Nepal and which other country?

China: the summit straddles the border between Nepal and the Tibet Autonomous Region of China; climbers from the north approach via Tibet's Rongbuk Glacier and the North Col.

Which city is the world's northernmost capital of a sovereign state?

Reykjavík, Iceland's capital, sits at about 64 degrees north on Faxaflói bay with roughly 140,000 residents; Helsinki, the next contender among capitals, is at 60 degrees.