Hiking Trivia
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96 free Hiking trivia questions with answers — nature quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
39 free Hiking trivia questions with answers. Hiking trivia for the trailhead, the campfire and the outdoors club quiz night. The questions cover the great long-distance trails - the Appalachian Trail's white blazes and 14 states, the Pacific Crest Trail's Forester Pass, the still-unfinished Continental Divide Trail and the Triple Crown they make up - plus the John Muir Trail, the Camino de Santiago, the Inca Trail's Dead Woman's Pass and Kilimanjaro's Coca-Cola route. There is trail lore too: who first thru-hiked the AT, the 67-year-old grandmother who did it in Keds, why a blaze is called a blaze, what a duck is, the seven Leave No Trace principles, the Ten Essentials and what people call hiking in New Zealand and Australia. Easy questions any weekend walker will get open the set; the later ones will test someone who has finished a thru-hike. Every answer has been checked against a reference page and each question shows its citation.
30 of 96 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The Appalachian Trail runs between Springer Mountain in Georgia and which mountain in Maine?
Mount Katahdin
Mount Katahdin stands in Maine's Baxter State Park, where severe weather sets in by mid-October, so northbound thru-hikers who leave Georgia in spring are told to plan on finishing before October 15.
Q 02Which state holds the most miles of the Appalachian Trail?
Virginia
Virginia holds about 550 miles of the trail, nearly a quarter of it and more than any other of its 14 states, while West Virginia next door has only a few miles to itself.
Q 03Which forester conceived the idea of the Appalachian Trail in 1921?
Benton MacKaye
Benton MacKaye pitched it in an architects' journal as a chain of farms and work camps for city-dwellers, not just a footpath; in 1935 he walked away from the trail conference after disputes with its chairman.
Q 04Who is credited with the first thru-hike of the Appalachian Trail, in 1948?
Earl Shaffer
Earl Shaffer, back from the Pacific war, said he set out to walk the war out of his system; trail officials at first took his claim for a fraud, and at 79 he walked the whole route again.
Q 05Grandma Gatewood hiked the Appalachian Trail in 1955 with no tent, sheltering under what?
Shower curtain
Shower curtain: it was her only cover from the rain, as she packed no tent or sleeping bag, carried a homemade sack and told her grown children only that she was going for a walk.
Q 06What footwear did Grandma Gatewood famously hike the Appalachian Trail in?
Canvas Keds sneakers
Canvas Keds sneakers carried her the whole way; a magazine article had led her to expect 'a nice lark', and she told a reporter afterwards, 'It wasn't.'
Q 07Who does most of the upkeep on the Appalachian Trail?
Volunteers
Volunteers from local trail clubs clear and repair the path; private citizens also laid out the route and built the footpath in the first place, finishing it in 1937.
Q 08The Pacific Crest Trail runs from the Mexican border to Canada through which three states?
California, Oregon and Washington
California, Oregon and Washington carry the trail along their mountain crests; most thru-hikers walk it northwards from the Mexican border, the practical direction in a normal year because of the snow.
Q 09Which mountain pass is the Pacific Crest Trail's highest point?
Forester Pass
Forester Pass, about 13,150 feet up on the boundary of Sequoia and Kings Canyon national parks, had to be blasted out of the rock; a plaque remembers Donald Downs, 18, fatally hurt by a boulder loosed in 1930.
Q 10Which 2012 memoir of a solo Pacific Crest Trail hike became a 2014 film starring Reese Witherspoon?
Wild
Wild follows Cheryl Strayed's 1,100-mile walk in 1995, begun with no hiking experience; Oprah Winfrey relaunched her book club with it, and it reached No. 1 on the New York Times best-seller list.
Q 11Which three trails make up the Triple Crown of Hiking?
Appalachian, Pacific Crest and Continental Divide
Appalachian, Pacific Crest and Continental Divide add up to about 7,900 miles through 22 states; finishers claim the award on the honour system, and in 2001 Brian Robinson walked all three within a single calendar year.
Q 12The Continental Divide Trail reaches the Canadian border inside which US national park?
Glacier
Glacier National Park in Montana holds the trail's northern end; snow can close its high passes, which is one reason most thru-hikers start in the south in spring and arrive there in late summer.
Q 13The Continental Divide Trail reaches its highest point on Grays Peak, which stands in which state?
Q 21Besides being Africa's highest peak, Kilimanjaro holds which other superlative?
Highest free-standing mountain in the world
Highest free-standing mountain in the world: Kilimanjaro is a dormant volcano built up by its own eruptions, not a peak in a range, so it rises about 4,900 m above the plateau around it with nothing beside it.
Q 22Kilimanjaro's Marangu route is nicknamed after which soft drink?
Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola: Marangu is the oldest route and the only one with sleeping huts, and the nickname is said to come from the soft drink sold at them and from its easy reputation; tents-only Machame is the 'Whiskey' route.
Q 23Kilimanjaro's summit, now Uhuru Peak, was named in 1889 after the ruler of which colonial power?
Colorado
Colorado's Grays Peak, roughly 14,270 feet, is the highest point on the Divide itself; the taller Mount Elbert stands near the line but not on it, so the trail's high point is not the state's.
Q 14The John Muir Trail finishes on the summit of which California peak?
Mount Whitney
Mount Whitney, the highest peak in the contiguous United States, ends the trail on its very summit, so finishers still face a descent of more than ten miles to the nearest road.
Q 15John Muir was a founder and first president of which conservation organisation, established in 1892?
The Sierra Club
The Sierra Club, which Muir led until his death in December 1914, had just set up a committee to get a High Sierra trail built; the state paid $10,000 to start work in 1915, and the route was named in his memory.
Q 16What symbol marks the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage routes?
A scallop shell
A scallop shell marks the route's waymarkers and hangs from pilgrims' packs; in the Middle Ages it was a keepsake collected at Compostela as proof that a pilgrim had completed the journey.
Q 17To earn the compostela, pilgrims prove they covered the Camino's final 100 km by collecting what in their credencial?
Stamps
Stamps from hostels, churches and town halls fill the credencial; walkers need the last 100 km, cyclists 200, and anyone doing only that minimum must be stamped at the start and end of every stage.
Q 18Which 2010 film stars Martin Sheen as a father walking the pilgrim route to Santiago after his son's death?
The Way
The Way was written and directed by Sheen's real-life son Emilio Estevez, who also plays the dead son; the father flies out only to collect the body, then walks the route himself carrying the ashes.
Q 19What is the highest point on the classic Inca Trail to Machu Picchu?
Dead Woman's Pass
Dead Woman's Pass, Warmiwañusqa in Quechua, stands about 4,200 m up and is crossed on the second day; the name comes from the ridge's outline, said to resemble a woman lying on her back.
Q 20In which month is the Inca Trail closed each year for maintenance?
February
February is when the trail shuts each year, in the rainy season, so that the litter walkers leave behind can be cleared.
Germany
Germany then ruled the region as German East Africa, and Hans Meyer named the summit Kaiser Wilhelm Peak when he and Ludwig Purtscheller first reached it; independent Tanzania renamed it Uhuru, Swahili for freedom.
Q 24What do New Zealanders call hiking?
Tramping
Tramping is New Zealand's word for walking over rough country; many of the tracks and huts trampers use were built for hunters culling introduced deer, and the Department of Conservation now runs over 950 huts.
Q 25Founded in 1876, which is the oldest outdoor club still active in the United States?
The Appalachian Mountain Club
The Appalachian Mountain Club began in Boston to explore New Hampshire's high peaks; in 1888 it built a hut at Madison Spring, modelled on Alpine shelters, the first of a chain of mountain huts it still runs.
Q 26What is the first of the seven Leave No Trace principles?
Plan ahead and prepare
Plan ahead and prepare covers more than packing: it asks hikers to learn an area's rules, weather and hazards before setting out, to avoid times of high use and to travel in small groups.
Q 27Which three US agencies produced the 1987 pamphlet 'Leave No Trace Land Ethics'?
NPS, Forest Service and BLM
NPS, Forest Service and BLM wrote it together after national park visits grew five-fold between 1950 and 1970; because rules alone antagonised visitors, the agencies turned to teaching low-impact habits instead.
Q 28The Ten Essentials list first appeared in print in the 1974 edition of which mountaineering book?
Freedom of the Hills
Freedom of the Hills first printed the list in its third edition in 1974; the first five items are meant to prevent and handle emergencies, the other five to get you safely through an unplanned night outdoors.
Q 29Which of these items is on the Ten Essentials list that hikers are urged to carry on every trip?
A headlamp
A headlamp is on the list because a walk that runs late can end in the dark, and a hands-free light lets you find the way out or signal for help; trekking poles, however useful, are not among the ten.
Q 30What colour are the blazes marking the main route of the Appalachian Trail?
White
White rectangles two inches wide and six tall are painted on trees and rocks along the whole route; side trails use the same shape in blue, and hikers who shortcut along them are nicknamed 'blue blazers'.