Tortola
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40 free Tortola trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Tortola is the largest of the British Virgin Islands, a steep green island about twelve miles long where most of the territory's people live. It is British, Caribbean and a little American all at once, and its story runs from Dutch privateers and Spanish raids to plantation riots, shipwrecks and a modern life built on sailing and finance. This quiz gathers the fun facts people look for about Tortola: where its name comes from, what money it spends, which forts still stand, who its famous sons and daughters are, and what you will eat, drink and hear when you visit. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so you get the story behind the fact. It suits travellers planning a trip or a cruise stop, sailors who already know the anchorages, and anyone who enjoys Caribbean history.
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Q 01Which harbour settlement on Tortola's south coast is the capital of the British Virgin Islands?
Road Town
Road Town takes its name from 'the roads', a sailors' term for a place less sheltered than a harbour that ships can still reach easily.
Q 02Tortola flies the British flag, but which currency is the official money used on the island?
US dollar
The US dollar is official on Tortola because the island sits so close to, and trades so often with, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.
Q 03Tortola's name matches a Spanish word for which bird, though a Dutch origin is also claimed?
Turtle dove
Turtle dove is what 'tórtola' means in Spanish, but the name may really be an English twist on Ter-Tholen, after an island in the Netherlands.
Q 04The channel between Tortola and the islands to its south is named after which English privateer?
Sir Francis Drake
Sir Francis Drake gives his name to the strait, which can be seen from Tortola's ridge-top trails stretching from Virgin Gorda to St. John.
Q 05Which hurricane devastated Tortola in September 2017, days before Boris Johnson toured the damage?
Irma
Irma did its worst British Virgin Islands damage on Tortola on 6 September 2017, and Johnson said the wreckage reminded him of photos of Hiroshima.
Q 06An islet across the channel south of Tortola is among several places reputed to have inspired which novel?
Treasure Island
Treasure Island is reputed to draw on Norman Island, where a mutinous crew buried a galleon's silver in 1750 and people from Tortola dug it up.
Q 07Melanie Amaro, raised on Tortola from the age of three, won the first US season of which talent show?
The X Factor
The X Factor made Amaro its first American winner in 2011, handing the singer who grew up with her grandmother on Tortola a $5 million recording contract.
Q 08Which singer, born and raised on Tortola, reached number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 with 'Replay'?
Iyaz
Iyaz was found through his Myspace page in 2008, and his debut single 'Replay' went on to enter the United Kingdom chart at number 1.
Q 09What is the oldest building in Tortola's capital, standing on Main Street since 1774?
The prison
The prison, officially HM Prison, went up on Main Street in 1774, two years before the British fortified Fort Burt above the harbour.
Q 10Which plantation crop dominated Tortola's economy for more than a century, until slavery was abolished?
Sugarcane
Sugarcane ruled Tortola until the 1800s, when beet grown in England and America offered a rival product and many landowners left the islands.
Q 11Tortola's airport sits on which small neighbour off its eastern tip, linked by a short bridge?
Beef Island
Beef Island is joined to Tortola by the short Queen Elizabeth II Bridge; the Queen herself opened the original in 1966, and a wider one replaced it in 2002.
Q 12Which peak on Tortola is the highest point in the whole Virgin Islands archipelago?
Mount Sage
Mount Sage tops every summit in the British and U.S. Virgin Islands, and old-growth forest on its slopes is said to be untouched since the time of Columbus.
Q 13Tortola, the largest of the British Virgin Islands, was formed by which geological process?
Volcanic activity
Q 21Which religious group, firm opponents of slaveholding, kept a settlement around Tortola from 1727 to 1768?
Quakers
Quakers were few and stayed only about four decades, yet their stand is credited with better treatment of the enslaved and a large free black population.
Q 22Tortola planter and politician Arthur Hodge was hanged in 1811 after a trial for murdering whom?
One of his slaves
One of his slaves, a man named Prosper, died after Hodge had him flogged over a fallen mango, and a free woman of colour gave the main evidence at the trial.
Q 23Riots that burned most of Tortola's capital in August 1853 began as a protest against a new tax on what?
Cattle
Volcanic activity built Tortola's steep hills, whereas one flat neighbour in the same island group is made entirely of coral reef deposits.
Q 14Tortola's capital is a leading Caribbean centre for 'bareboating', the self-hire chartering of what?
Yachts
Yachts hired with no skipper or crew are the heart of bareboating, and many charter firms run their fleets out of Tortola's main harbour.
Q 15Which rum brand, first bottled on Tortola, follows the Royal Navy's old daily-ration recipe?
Pusser's
Pusser's is Royal Navy slang for a purser, and the brand was born in 1979, nine years after the fleet poured its last daily tot on 'Black Tot Day'.
Q 16Which rum cocktail from the British Virgin Islands blends pineapple, orange and cream of coconut?
Painkiller
The Painkiller was first mixed in the 1970s at the Soggy Dollar Bar on Jost Van Dyke, and it is finished with a generous grating of fresh nutmeg.
Q 17Columbus named the Virgin Islands, Tortola among them, after the 11,000 virgin followers of which saint?
Ursula
Saint Ursula was a martyr said to have had 11,000 virgin companions, and the sheer number of islands reminded Columbus of them in 1493.
Q 18Dutch privateer Joost van Dyk founded Tortola's first permanent settlement at which West End anchorage?
Soper's Hole
Soper's Hole was where van Dyk's settlers farmed cotton and tobacco, and the nearby island of Jost Van Dyke is thought to carry his name.
Q 19Ferries from Tortola cross to Charlotte Amalie and Red Hook on which neighbouring American island?
Saint Thomas
Saint Thomas, in the U.S. Virgin Islands, is linked by ferry to both Tortola's capital and its West End, so a short boat ride takes passengers from British to American territory.
Q 20Smuggler's Cove, Long Bay and Josiah's Bay line which side of Tortola, home to its best beaches?
North
North is the shore to head for on Tortola: besides those three, it holds Cane Garden Bay, Brewer's Bay and Lambert Beach.
Cattle carried a new head tax passed in June 1853, and the rural labourers who marched on the capital that August went on to burn plantation houses across the island.
Q 24Africans liberated from illegal slave ships by the Royal Navy were settled in which area of Tortola?
Kingstown
Kingstown was unsettled until the freed Africans arrived, and St. Phillip's Church there became one of the earliest free black churches in the Americas.
Q 25Samuel Hodge of Tortola became the second black recipient of which British gallantry medal?
Victoria Cross
The Victoria Cross went to Hodge for an 1866 assault in The Gambia, where he hacked open two barricaded gates with an axe before being shot down.
Q 26William Thornton learned on Tortola of a design contest he went on to win for which Washington landmark?
The Capitol
The Capitol became Thornton's winning design: a trained physician, he heard of the contest on Tortola and was let in late because no plan had yet been chosen.
Q 27Tortola-born silversmith Richard Humphreys founded which school, now America's oldest historically black college?
Cheyney University
Cheyney University began in 1837 as a Philadelphia school for African Americans, funded by $10,000 that Humphreys set aside in his will.
Q 28Tortola's community college is named after H. Lavity Stoutt, who was the first holder of which office?
Chief Minister
Chief Minister was a post Stoutt held in three separate spells, and he pushed for the college even though his own schooling ended after primary school.
Q 29Fort Purcell, a ruined Dutch-built fort on Tortola, is better known by which nickname?
The Dungeon
The Dungeon is a twist on 'donjon', the name the Spanish in Puerto Rico gave the fort, which has never actually been used as one.
Q 30Fort Burt, a colonial fort guarding the harbour of Tortola's capital, is now the site of what?
A hotel
A hotel was built on the ruins after a naval commander bought them in 1953, then the only one on Tortola, and an original cannon still stands on its veranda.