60 free Mont Blanc trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Mont Blanc is the roof of Western Europe, and this trivia quiz climbs all over it. It covers the geography and geology (why the height changes every two years, which countries share the massif, where the border dispute lies), the mountaineering history (Saussure's reward, Balmat and Paccard's 1786 first ascent, Marie Paradis and Henriette d'Angeville, the Goûter Route and its deadly couloir) and the surprising things that have happened on the summit, from a doomed observatory to a hot tub and fifty paragliders. The quiz also takes in Chamonix and the first Winter Olympics, Courmayeur, the Aiguille du Midi cable car, the Skyway Monte Bianco, the Mer de Glace, the Mont Blanc Tunnel and its 1999 fire, the two Air India crashes, the Ultra-Trail du Mont-Blanc and the speed records of Kilian Jornet and others. For good measure there are a couple of questions on the pen brand and the chestnut dessert that borrowed the mountain's name. Every answer was verified against Wikipedia's articles on Mont Blanc and its massif, tunnel, towns and climbers, and each question links to its source. Try our Alps and Mountains of the World quizzes next.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Roughly how high is Mont Blanc?
About 4,800 metres
The exact figure changes because the summit is a dome of ice and snow whose thickness varies.
Q 02Mont Blanc is the highest mountain in Europe outside which range?
The Caucasus
Only Mount Elbrus in Russia is more topographically prominent in Europe.
Q 03The Mont Blanc massif straddles which three countries?
France, Italy and Switzerland
The three borders meet at a tripoint near the summit of Mont Dolent.
Q 04Which two towns face each other across Mont Blanc, one in France and one in Italy?
Chamonix and Courmayeur
Saint-Gervais-les-Bains is the third town whose commune surrounds the mountain.
Q 05Mont Blanc's summit sits on the watershed between which two great rivers?
The Rhône and the Po
It also lies between the climatic zones of the northern-western Alps and the southern Alps.
Q 06Mont Blanc and its neighbours are formed mainly from what rock?
Granite
The batholith was forced up through gneiss and mica schists during the Variscan mountain-building of the late Palaeozoic.
Q 07How many major independent summits over 4,000 metres does the Mont Blanc massif contain?
Eleven
All of them are shared between France and Italy; Switzerland's highest in the massif is the Aiguille d'Argentière.
Q 08Whose 1744 map of the Chamonix valley contains the first printed appearance of the name "Mont Blanc"?
Pierre Martel
Windham and Pococke had visited the Mer de Glace in 1741 and published their account in 1744.
Q 09Who made the first recorded ascent of Mont Blanc on 8 August 1786?
Jacques Balmat and Michel-Gabriel Paccard
The climb traditionally marks the start of modern mountaineering.
Q 10Which Swiss scientist offered a reward in 1760 for the first ascent, and climbed the peak himself in 1787?
Horace-Bénédict de Saussure
He is often called the founder of alpinism and is credited with building the first successful solar oven.
Q 11Jacques Balmat was honoured after the first ascent by Victor Amadeus III, ruler of which state?
The Kingdom of Sardinia
He collected Saussure's 25-year-old reward and guided the scientist to the top a year later.
Q 12What was Michel-Gabriel Paccard's profession?
Medical doctor
Born in Chamonix, he studied medicine in Turin and met Saussure through their shared passion for botany and minerals.
Q 13Who was the first woman to reach the summit of Mont Blanc, in 1808?
Marie Paradis
A poor Chamonix maidservant, she was so exhausted at the top she could not speak.
Q 21How high is the rock summit hidden beneath Mont Blanc's ice cap?
4,792 m
It was found in 2005 to lie about 40 metres west of the ice-covered summit.
Q 22What is the most popular way up Mont Blanc, also called the Voie Royale?
The Goûter Route
It usually takes two days from Saint-Gervais via the Tramway du Mont-Blanc.
Q 23What makes the Grand Couloir on the standard way up from Saint-Gervais so notorious?
Frequent rockfalls
Between 1990 and 2011, 74 people died between the Tête Rousse and Goûter huts.
Q 14Henriette d'Angeville, who climbed Mont Blanc in 1838, was notable as the first woman to do what?
Reach the summit without being carried
She went on to scale 21 more peaks, the last at age 65, and founded a mineralogy museum in Lausanne.
Q 15How large is the area on Mont Blanc's summit disputed between France and Italy?
About 65 hectares
Italy says the border follows the watershed over the top; France says it skirts the summit, leaving it wholly French.
Q 16In what year does Italy claim a French survey moved the Mont Blanc border onto the summit?
1865
The 1860 Turin act annexing Savoy to France is still considered valid by both governments.
Q 17Which famous engineer agreed to build a summit observatory for Pierre Janssen if rock could be found under the ice?
Gustave Eiffel
Tunnels dug 12 metres below the ice in 1891 found nothing solid, so his project was dropped.
Q 18What eventually happened to the Janssen observatory built on the summit ice in 1893?
A crevasse opened under it and it fell
Levers attached to the ice kept it upright until it began leaning heavily in 1906.
Q 19What is the lowest temperature ever recorded on Mont Blanc, during the January 1893 cold wave?
-43 °C
The summit is a permanent ice cap with typical temperatures around -20 °C.
Q 20Since the 2003 remeasurement, how often is Mont Blanc's height officially measured?
Every two years
The 2003 survey found the peak had shifted 75 cm from where it had been in 2002.
Q 24The Three Monts route crosses which two other 4,000-metre peaks before the final push?
Mont Blanc du Tacul and Mont Maudit
Climbers sleep at the Cosmiques Hut after taking the Aiguille du Midi cable car.
Q 25How many mountaineers reach the summit of Mont Blanc in a typical year?
20,000
On busy August weekends the rescue service averages 12 missions.
Q 26A 1994 estimate put total climbing deaths on Mont Blanc at how many, more than any other mountain?
6,000 to 8,000
Actual annual figures since the 1990s run between 10 and 20, not the "100 a year" sometimes claimed.
Q 27Which is the highest mountain hut on Mont Blanc, at 4,362 m?
Vallot
It is an emergency shelter passed on the final Bosses ridge.
Q 28Which future pope helped discover the normal Italian route on Mont Blanc in 1890?
Pius XI
Then Father Achille Ratti, he was climbing with Giovanni Bonin and Luigi Grasselli.
Q 29Pilot Henri Giraud achieved what on Mont Blanc in 1960?
He landed a plane on the summit
The summit is only about 30 metres long.
Q 30Who set the fastest Mont Blanc round trip from Chamonix, 4 hours 57 minutes, in 2013?
Kilian Jornet
Swiss runner Pierre-André Gobet had held the record at 5:10:14 since 1990.