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50 free North Cascades National Park trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This North Cascades National Park trivia quiz covers the wild 'American Alps' of northern Washington, a 1968 park that is almost entirely wilderness, holds more glaciers than any U.S. park outside Alaska, and sees fewer visitors in a year than Yellowstone gets in a busy day. It ranges across the two units split by the Skagit River dams, the turquoise water of Diablo Lake, the road-free village of Stehekin at the head of Lake Chelan, and the jagged Picket Range with peaks named Fury, Terror and Phantom. There is plenty of history and science too: the fur trader who first crossed the range in 1814, George McClellan's failed railroad survey, the dams that light Seattle, Jack Kerouac's summer on Desolation Peak, Fred Beckey's first ascents, the grizzly restoration debate and the glacier research programme that has tracked climate change here since the 1950s. Questions run from easy to expert with the difficulty shown on each one, so it works for a car game on the North Cascades Highway or a serious park-nerd challenge. Every answer was checked against a reference page and each question carries its citation. If you enjoy it, try our Mount Rainier, Olympic and US National Parks quizzes next.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Because of their jagged, glaciated peaks, the North Cascades are nicknamed the American what?
Alps
Visitors in 1892 petitioned for a park because the scenery was 'greater than Switzerland's'.
Q 02Which country lies directly across the park's northern boundary?
Canada
The 1846 Oregon Treaty fixed the border at the 49th parallel, which is now also the park's northern edge.
Q 03Roughly how far is the park from Seattle?
About 100 miles
Sea-Tac airport is about 120 miles from the main visitor centre and 190 from Chelan on the far side.
Q 04North Cascades National Park is in which U.S. state?
Washington
Its northern edge is the Canadian border, and British Columbia's provincial parks continue the protected land north of the 49th parallel.
Q 05Which river, dammed into a chain of reservoirs, splits the park into a north and a south unit?
Skagit
It is the largest river flowing into Puget Sound, and its dams supply nearly 90 percent of Seattle's electricity.
Q 06In what year was North Cascades National Park established?
1968
A famous California park was signed into existence on the very same day.
Q 07Which other national park was created on the same day as North Cascades?
Redwood
The 1968 act also created the two national recreation areas that make up the rest of the park complex.
Q 08Roughly how many glaciers does the park contain, the most of any U.S. park outside Alaska?
About 312
That is about a third of all the glaciers in the lower 48, though the ice has lost roughly 40 percent of its volume since the Little Ice Age.
Q 09Which is the largest glacier in the park, on the north slope of the peak that shares its name?
Boston
Austin Post's 1971 aerial inventory measured it at 1,730 acres.
Q 10What is the highest mountain in the park, at 9,220 feet?
Goode
It hides in remote backcountry in the southern unit; the much-photographed second-highest peak sits in the northwest corner.
Q 11Which oft-photographed peak, 9,131 feet high in the park's northwest corner, is its second-highest?
Mount Shuksan
The classic postcard view is from Heather Meadows in the national forest outside the park, with the peak reflected in Picture Lake.
Q 12The northern unit's jagged Picket Range includes peaks with which set of ominous names?
Fury, Terror and Phantom
The range is only 6 miles long yet packs in 21 peaks over 7,500 feet.
Q 13Roughly how many visitors did the park proper record in 2024, while the adjoining recreation area drew almost a million?
About 16,500
Q 21Desolation Peak got its name from what?
A 1926 forest fire
The one-room wooden lookout on top is 15 miles from the nearest road and is still staffed each summer.
Q 22Which roadless village at the head of Lake Chelan is served by the 'Lady of the Lake' ferry?
Stehekin
It has about 85 year-round residents and no road link to the outside world.
Q 23The road-free village at the head of Lake Chelan has a Salishan name meaning what?
The way through
The head of the lake was an east-west corridor across the Cascades for at least 9,000 years, and canoes were cached there.
Almost everyone stays on the highway, which lies entirely inside the recreation area; only two primitive roads enter the actual park.
Q 14Which highway, the only road across the North Cascades park complex, closes every winter for avalanches?
State Route 20
Avalanche chutes over 2,000 feet long cross the road, which is why plows give up from late November until late April.
Q 15Almost all of the park is protected under a wilderness designation named for which first NPS director?
Stephen Mather
Forester Bob Marshall had argued for setting the region aside as wilderness back in the mid-1930s.
Q 16Roughly what percentage of the park is protected as designated wilderness?
93%
As a result there is nowhere inside the park where you can drive to a campground; every night out is a backcountry night.
Q 17Which utility built the dams whose reservoirs now sit between the park's two units?
Seattle City Light
Almost 12,000 acres of timber had to be cleared before Ross Dam flooded the valley, a job finished in 1958.
Q 18Diablo Lake owes its famous turquoise colour to what?
Suspended glacial flour
Thunder Creek carries meltwater from dozens of glaciers into the reservoir, and the fine rock powder never quite settles.
Q 19Which is the largest of the three reservoirs between the park's units, at about 12,000 acres?
Ross Lake
It stretches all the way to the Canadian border, and its shore is the trailhead for the six-mile climb to Kerouac's old lookout.
Q 20Which Beat writer spent 63 days of the summer of 1956 as a fire lookout on Desolation Peak?
Jack Kerouac
He mined the summer for The Dharma Bums, Lonesome Traveler and Desolation Angels, plus a set of haiku he called 'Desolation pops'.
Q 24Which fur-company Scot first crossed the North Cascades' high passes, in 1814?
Alexander Ross
He worked for the American-owned Pacific Fur Company and once traded 1,500 pelts in a single season.
Q 25Which future Civil War general surveyed the North Cascades for a railroad in 1853 and found them too steep?
George B. McClellan
Later Army expeditions in 1882, 1883 and 1887 agreed the range was virtually impenetrable; no highway crossed it until 1972.
Q 26Tool-making rock was quarried for 8,400 years near which mountain just east of the park?
Hozomeen
Microblades made from the chert turn up across the valleys to the west, and 9,600-year-old blades were found at a popular pass inside the park.
Q 27Prehistoric microblades about 9,600 years old were found at which popular day-hike spot reached from Marblemount?
Cascade Pass
The pass is a 3.7-mile trail from the end of a gravel road out of Marblemount, and another 260 prehistoric sites are known in the park.
Q 28The Nlaka'pamux people of the North Cascades were also long known by what name, taken from an explorer?
Thompson Indians
Thompson himself described one inland tribal lodge as 240 feet long.
Q 29Which mountaineer, who summited Sinister Peak at 15, wrote the three-volume Cascade Alpine Guide?
Fred Beckey
He made at least two dozen first ascents in the range; his Cascade Alpine Guide first appeared in the early 1970s.
Q 30Which climbing rule applies throughout the park to protect the rock?
No new fixed anchors
Only removable protection like chocks and cams is allowed, since pitons deface the rock.