2 • iQuiz Method

Geography of Canada: An Interactive Quiz

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✔︎ Alberta and Saskatchewan are the only two landlocked provinces. You are doing well, move to the top. That will put you at the peak of Mount Logan.

Annapolis Valley, Canada’s first fruit-growing region, is in Nova Scotia! Let’s go back, get high on Mount Logan and take a better look at this last tour.

Banff may be more famous, but Wood Buffalo National Park, bordering Alberta and the Northwest Territories, is almost seven times as large. Let’s return to the Great Lakes to get our bearings.

✔︎ Cape Breton Island is indeed larger. Let’s stroll the docks for fresh air.

✔︎ So you seem to be politically inclined! Charlottetown is the smallest provincial capitol. Let’s step up to something great, like the Great Lakes.

Salt, creosote, sea gulls, huge container ships. We are at Canada’s number 1 container port. Are we in Halifax or Montreal?

Lake Erie has shorelines in New York, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Ontario. Unlike any of the Great Lakes, the largest national park in North America is within Canada. Would that be Banff or Wood Buffalo National Park?

Fredericton was once the smallest provincial capitol, but it passed Charlottetown in the 1951 census. Return to the docks.

Did you know that Lake Erie has no Canadian shoreline? — or is it Lake Michigan that has no Canadian shoreline?

Halifax Harbor is the principal port in the Maritimes, but Montreal handles more containerized cargo. Dock work does not seem to suit you. Perhaps politics is your calling. Let’s start small. Should we visit Charlottetown or Fredericton to find the smallest provincial capitol in Canada?

Although the island of Newfoundland has a longer coastline, most of the province’s area is on the mainland, in Labrador. Perhaps you will do better with rivers. Does the Saint John flow through only New Brunswick or New Brunswick and Quebec?

There is a large lake that lies directly north of Winnipeg. Is the name of this lake Winnipegosis or is it simply lake Winnipeg?

We tend to think of Alberta and Manitoba as inland and far from water. One of them is indeed landlocked. Which one?

The thin air up here seems to clear the mind. Atop Mount Logan we are in the Yukon Territory, 5951 m above sea level. Take the Trans-Canada Highway west. This is the world’s longest paved highway — from St. John’s, Newfoundland to a city in British Columbia: Vancouver or Victoria which costal city?

✔︎ Labrador, which has been part of Newfoundland since 1927, is almost three times the size of its offshore partner. You are off to a successful start. Let’s talk lakes.

Manitoba’s northeastern border is on Hudson Bay, with direct access to the Atlantic and Arctic oceans. No landlock here. Go climb a mountain! Climb Canada’s highest mountain. Will that put you on Mount Logan or Mount Robson?

✔︎ Lake Michigan is entirely in the United States. Well done! Some provinces have no shoreline: lake, bay, or ocean. They are said to be landlocked.

✔︎ The port of Montreal handles 5 Tg of containerized cargo each year. That is more than twice as much as the 2.3 Tg handled annually in Halifax. From the port of Montreal, veer toward the great lakes.

The journey begins in Newfoundland. Is the largest part of the tenth province an island or mainland?

✔︎ Through here flows the St. John, but not into Quebec. You seem to do well with rivers. Try lakes.

The Okanagan Valley produces nearly half of Canada’s cherries, and a third of its apples and peaches. The fruit of your efforts is at hand. Take the Trans-Canada to Victoria and watch the sun set.

Prince Edward Island, as a province, has a higher status, but it is barely more than half the size of Nova Scotia’s Cape Breton Island. Fresh air might help your thinking, so let’s walk the docks.

The Saint John River originates in Maine. Some of its tributaries rise in Quebec, but New Brunswick is the only province in Canada through which it flows. Let’s get off to a better start and depart once again from Newfoundland.

At 3953 m, British Columbia’s Mount Robson is almost 2 km lower than Mount Logan. Let’s loop back to the landlocked provinces to better our score on this tour.

Vancouver is the end of the road on the mainland. If you drive to the end of the westernmost end of the Trans-Canada you will be seven blocks south of the British Columbia legislature in Victoria. While in beautiful B. C., we can visit a valley famous as a major fruit producer. Will that put us in the Annapolis Valley or the Okanagan Valley?

✔︎ Put your vehicle on a ferry to cross the Strait of Georgia to reach Victoria: the official western terminus of the highway. As the sun sets here in the west, our quiz also comes to a close — or depart to the beginning to attempt the trip in fewer passages.

✔︎ That makes sense, doesn’t it? Lake Winnipeg, with an area of 24 390 km^2, is the third largest lake lying entirely within Canada’s borders. Talk of lakes makes one think of docks.

Winnipegosis is one of the big lakes in the middle of Manitoba, but it lies to the west of Lake Winnipeg and northwest of the city. Maybe water isn’t your medium. Let’s return to shore — a large island. Which island would you say is larger, Prince Edward Island or Cape Breton Island?

✔︎ Wood Buffalo National Park was established in 1922 to protect Canada’s last wood bison. Since that time the herd has increased from 1500 to over 5000. Let’s loop back to the Great Lakes and correct a few errors in our path.