60 free Zion National Park trivia questions with answers — geography quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Zion National Park trivia quiz covers the red-rock canyon country of southwestern Utah where the Colorado Plateau, Great Basin and Mojave Desert meet. It ranges across Zion Canyon and the Virgin River that carved it, Angels Landing and its chains, the Narrows, the Great White Throne, Kolob Arch, the Zion-Mount Carmel tunnel with its cliff-side windows, and the bighorn, condors and 19 kinds of bat that live there. There is plenty of history too: the Ancestral Puebloans and Southern Paiute, the Dominguez-Escalante padres of 1776, Mormon settler Isaac Behunin who named the canyon, Powell's 'Mukuntuweap', Taft's 1909 monument and the 1919 name change to Zion, the Union Pacific's rail-and-bus tours, Gilbert Stanley Underwood's lodge, the 1995 landslide that trapped 450 people and the shuttle buses that took over the canyon in 2000. Questions run from easy to expert with the difficulty shown on each one, so it works for a shuttle-queue game 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 Bryce Canyon, Arches and US National Parks quizzes next.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Zion National Park is in which U.S. state?
Utah
It sits where three great geographic provinces meet, which is why its plant and animal life is so varied.
Q 02Which town sits at the park's south entrance and shares its territory with the park?
Springdale
The first settler family farmed the canyon in summer and wintered there in the 1860s.
Q 03The North Fork of which watercourse carved Zion Canyon?
Virgin River
Its gradient of 50 to 80 feet per mile is one of the steepest of any stream in North America, and it moves about 3 million tons of rock and sand a year.
Q 04The canyon's reddish and tan walls are made of which rock formation?
Navajo Sandstone
It was laid down as a vast desert of dunes; nine formations in the park record about 150 million years of Mesozoic sediment.
Q 05Roughly how deep is Zion Canyon at its deepest?
Up to 2,640 feet
It runs 15 miles long, and the road up it ends after 6 miles.
Q 06Which president first protected the canyon in 1909, as Mukuntuweap National Monument?
William Howard Taft
Paintings by Frederick Dellenbaugh at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair and a Scribner's article helped make the case.
Q 07Which explorer visited the canyon in 1872 and named it Mukuntuweap, believing it to be the Paiute name?
John Wesley Powell
His survey photographer Jack Hillers waded the canyon for four days and nearly froze to get his pictures.
Q 08Why did the Park Service push to rename the monument 'Zion' in 1918?
Officials thought Spanish and Indian names deterred visitors
Acting NPS director Horace Albright drafted the proposal; the new name was one local Mormons already used.
Q 09In what year did Congress make Zion a national park?
1919
Woodrow Wilson signed the act on November 19.
Q 10Which Mormon settler farmed the canyon floor from 1863 and is credited with naming it Zion?
Isaac Behunin
He grew corn, tobacco and fruit trees near the site of today's lodge, and the canyon floor stayed farmed until 1909.
Q 11Which two Spanish padres passed near the Kolob Canyons in 1776, the first Europeans known in the area?
Dominguez and Escalante
Trapper Jedediah Smith explored downstream stretches in 1825, and Mormon farmers arrived in the valley in 1847.
Q 12Which 1,488-foot rock fin, reached by a chain-lined trail cut in 1926, is the park's most famous hike?
Angels Landing
It used to be called the Temple of Aeolus, and since 2022 you need a permit to go past Scout Lookout.
Q 13What are Walter's Wiggles?
21 steep switchbacks on the trail to the famous fin
Q 21What is the most famous feature of the Zion-Mount Carmel Highway, opened in 1930?
A 1.1-mile tunnel with windows cut through the cliff
Oversized vehicles need a permit and one-way traffic control to get through.
Q 22Which cross-hatched formation is the landmark of the park's east side?
Checkerboard Mesa
The East Temple stands nearby along State Route 9.
Q 23The road up Zion Canyon ends at a spot named for the Paiute coyote god — what is it called?
Temple of Sinawava
They are named for Walter Ruesch, the park's first superintendent, who built them in 1926.
Q 14By 2025, roughly how many deaths had been confirmed at or near the chained summit trail?
18
That was the most of any hiking trail in the state, which is partly why permits arrived in 2022.
Q 15Which classic hike involves wading up the river between sandstone walls as little as 20 feet apart?
The Narrows
The full top-down route from Chamberlain's Ranch is 16 miles and about 12 hours; beyond Big Springs you need a permit.
Q 16Which geologist descended and named the park's famous river gorge in 1872 as part of the Wheeler Survey?
Grove Karl Gilbert
His party rode horseback from Navajo Lake all the way through to the town at the park gate.
Q 17Which slot canyon on the Kolob Terrace is famous for its tube-shaped passage?
The Subway
Lava Point nearby gives a panoramic view of the whole area and holds the park's primitive third campground.
Q 18Which span in the park's northwestern section is one of the longest natural arches in the world?
Kolob Arch
Measured at 287.4 feet in 2006, it is a whisker shorter than Landscape Arch in Arches; reaching it is a 14-mile round trip.
Q 19Where does the name 'Kolob' come from?
Mormon scripture, the heavenly place nearest God
Settlers from Parowan and Cedar City used the Kolob country for timber and grazing from 1851.
Q 20The Kolob Canyons, a separate national monument from 1937, joined the park in what year?
1956
It is reached from Interstate 15 at exit 40, near Cedar City.
A mile-long paved trail carries on from there to the mouth of the river gorge.
Q 24Since 2000, how do most visitors travel up Zion Canyon from spring to fall?
On free propane shuttle buses
Private cars are banned on the scenic drive from early April to late October; the fleet includes two 36-seat electric trams.
Q 25Which architect designed the rustic Zion Lodge, built in 1925 for the railroad-owned Utah Parks Company?
Gilbert Stanley Underwood
It rose on the site of Wylie Camp, a 1917 tent camp; the railway sold ten-day rail-and-bus tours of Zion, Bryce and the Grand Canyon's North Rim.
Q 26How many people were trapped at Zion Lodge when a 1995 landslide washed out the canyon road?
About 450
A one-lane emergency road was built within 24 hours to get everyone out.
Q 27Which 1969 Paul Newman and Robert Redford film shot scenes in the park?
Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid
Silent westerns like The Deadwood Coach had used the canyon as far back as 1924.
Q 28Which video game's 'Honest Hearts' expansion is set in Zion?
Fallout: New Vegas
Scenes for the TV series Extinct were also shot in the park in 2017.
Q 29Roughly what share of the park did the 2009 Omnibus Public Land Management Act designate as wilderness?
About 85%
That is 124,406 acres, signed by Barack Obama.
Q 30Roughly how many visitors did the park attract in 2025?
Nearly 5 million
That puts it among the busiest parks in the country despite covering only 229 square miles.