Mount Wilson is a remote mountain located in the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve in eastern Alaska. At an elevation of 15,325 feet, it is one of the highest peaks in the Alaska Range. The mountain’s remote location and extreme weather conditions make it a challenging climb attempted only by experienced mountaineers. Let’s explore 45 riddles related to this majestic Alaskan peak and reveal the answers.
Riddles about Mount Wilson’s geography and climate
What rises nearly five miles into the sky but doesn’t have a peak?
Mount Wilson is so high that its summit basically sits inside a layer of clouds. So while it rises almost five vertical miles, there is no visible “peak” peeking out above the fog.
What belongs to a range but isn’t found in the kitchen?
Mount Wilson belongs to Alaska’s Wrangell mountain range, which has nothing to do with cooking ranges found in kitchens.
Why does precipitation cause visibility issues on Mount Wilson?
The extreme elevation of Mount Wilson means it sits high up in the atmosphere. Moisture and clouds often envelop the peak, severely hindering visibility.
Why are there no trees on the upper slopes of Mount Wilson?
At over 15,000 feet elevation and subject to intensely cold temperatures and howling winds, trees cannot survive on the upper reaches of the mountain. Only hardy mosses, lichens and occasional wildflowers cling to existence.
What turns to ice but isn’t water?
The extreme winds whipping around Mount Wilson’s summit can turn falling snow into rock-hard ice crystals known as rime ice. This “wind-blown ice” adheres to the mountain’s rock faces and is a hazard for climbers.
Riddles about Mount Wilson’s geology
What crumbles but has no crumbs and runs but has no legs?
Glaciers! Specifically, the huge glaciers sculpting and slowly carving away at Mount Wilson and surrounding peaks. From a distance these rivers of ice may seem solid and stable, but they are actually flowing, fracturing and crumbling constantly.
What natural process lasts millions of years but results in a surface only thousands of years old?
The extreme uplift pressures and glacial erosion shaping Mount Wilson means that while the overall mountain formation process has occurred over many millions of years, the actual surface terrain exposed by retreating glaciers may only be a few thousand years old.
What creation needs destruction to thrive?
Glaciers depend on continual erosion and destruction of the underlying mountain peaks in order to keep flowing and carving new landscapes over time. In the case of Mount Wilson, the slow demolition of the mountain by grinding glaciers allows the ice rivers to keep moving.
Riddles about Mount Wilson’s exploration history
Who visited in 1890 but took 118 years to return?
Famed explorer Frederick Schwatka spotted Mount Wilson in 1890 but it wasn’t until 2008 that another recorded successful summiting occurred. The intervening years saw many failed summit attempts due to the peak’s isolation and violent weather.
What took only hours to complete but years to prepare for?
The first complete summit of Mount Wilson occurred on August 8th, 2008 by 11 Russian mountaineers. Though the final ascent along the mile-high Mazeno Ridge route took less than a day, the team spent years planning the extremely technical climb up one of the world’s most dangerous mountains.
Why bring eggs but hope they don’t hatch?
Because of Mount Wilson’s remote location, climbers need to be completely self-sufficient, often packing unusual items like powdered eggs. But they need to hope those eggs and other perishable supplies don’t go bad before the expedition ends!
Riddles about the dangers on Mount Wilson
What is the greatest risk on Mount Wilson that doesn’t involve falling?
While tumbling down one of Mount Wilson’s nearly vertical slopes is an obvious danger, extreme cold and stormy weather claim more lives. Temperatures plunging to -40 F, accompanied by blistering 70 mph winds, can lead to deadly hypothermia and frostbite.
What quenches thirst but can also cause it?
Water! Bringing adequate water and fluids is vital on the dry slopes of Mount Wilson to avoid dehydration. But paradoxically, extreme cold can suppress thirst signals, causing climbers to not drink enough and still become dangerously dehydrated.
Why stare into the clouds when climbing Mount Wilson?
Sudden whiteout conditions caused by enveloping cloud cover are a major threat, sometimes causing total loss of visibility. Climbers caught in whiteouts can easily become disoriented and lost, making it critical to be vigilant about monitoring incoming clouds and fog.
Riddles about Mount Wilson’s unique wilderness
What place is always white but never cold?
The Lowell Glacier near the base of Mount Wilson is covered year-round in glistening white ice and snow. But due to Alaska’s coastal influences, valley glaciers like Lowell often have relatively warm microclimates compared to the freezing temperatures encountered high up on the mountain.
What sleeps in summer but runs free in fall?
Dynamic glaciers like the Lowell undergo seasonal changes, including slower summer flows when cooler temperatures preserve accumulated ice and snow. But in fall, warming temps and increased meltwater cause faster glacial flows.
What natural wonder starts tiny but grows large enough to reshape mountains?
Glaciers often start small as compacted pockets of snow. But over centuries and millennia, enormous ice rivers like the Lowell Glacier can grow massive enough to carve away entire mountain ranges, including peaks like Mount Wilson.
Riddles about Mount Wilson’s extreme isolation
Where can you stand surrounded by miles of mountaintops but not see a single sign of civilization?
The breathtaking scope of the remote Saint Elias mountain range allows adrenaline junkies to be surrounded by literally dozens of towering peaks, yet gaze out at near-pristine wilderness in all directions from Mount Wilson’s summit.
Where is the highest airport in North America located more than 70 miles from the nearest road?
In this roadless wilderness, small bush planes provide the only reasonable way to access base camps to climb Mount Wilson and other area peaks. The base camps themselves sit on makeshift glacier airstrips that are the highest airports in North America.
What has trees but no forest and rocks but no minerals?
Unlike lower terrain, no trees can survive on Mount Wilson’s barren slopes. And the peak’s violent upthrusts of primordial rock contain no valuable minerals or ores to attract prospectors and miners. So the mountain remains very remote and undeveloped.
Riddles about Mount Wilson’s animal life
What exhibits great patience but isn’t very still?
Hearty mountain goats constantly roam Mount Wilson’s rocky cliffs and slopes searching for scarce grass and lichens to graze. Despite the challenging living conditions, they manage to eke out an existence on terrain that is perpetually shifting under the grinding force of glaciers.
Who brings cold air inside to stay warm?
Unique animals like Alaskan pika manage the punishing winters around Mount Wilson by building underground snow dens to huddle in. The small mammals allow cold external air to permeate and chill their dens, creating an insulating buffer protecting them from frigid outside temps.
What snacks bring their food and drink inside with them?
Tough marmots inhabiting Mount Wilson’s high slopes snip and gather hardy mosses and lichens from exposed rocks, then carry the vegetation back to their burrows to feed through the winter. This portable food supply also brings moisture that the water-deprived marmots rely on until emerging in spring.
Conclusion
Hopefully these riddles have helped bring some intrigue and color to the little-known world encapsulated by Alaska’s remote Mount Wilson. This towering peak is a bastion of dangers, challenges, isolation and unpredictable weather that allow only the hardiest explorers and wildlife to exist. But therein lies its exotic allure as one of the last nearly-unconquered wilderness fortresses in North America.
