What type of terrain does spain have

Spain is in southwestern Europe and has borders with France in the north and Portugal in the west. Most of its territory is a peninsula, but it also has two large archipelagos. The Balearic Islands are off the coast of Catalonia and the region of Valencia. The Canary Islands are in the Atlantic ocean, about 1, kilometres from the Andalusian coast, the southernmost end of the peninsula.

Spain also has to Autonomous Cities: Ceuta and Melilla. They are in northern Africa and connected by frequent ferry services to the coast of Andalusia. Mainland Spain, together with Portugal, forms the Iberian Peninsula, surrounded by the Mediterranean Sea to the east and south, the Atlantic ocean to the west and parts of the north and south, and the Cantabrian Sea to the north. The total land area is just over , square kilometres, 12, km 2 of which are the islands.

Amanda Briney. Geography Expert. Amanda Briney, M. Updated August 30, Featured Video. Cite this Article Format. Briney, Amanda. An Overview of Spain. The World's 17 Smallest Countries. Geography of Tunisia, Africa's Northernmost Country. Your Privacy Rights. To change or withdraw your consent choices for ThoughtCo. At any time, you can update your settings through the "EU Privacy" link at the bottom of any page.

These choices will be signaled globally to our partners and will not affect browsing data. We and our partners process data to: Actively scan device characteristics for identification. This is due to the presence at the centre of the peninsula of a vast plateau, known as the Meseta, divided into two smaller plateaus by the Sistema Central mountain range.

A series of other mountain ranges around the plateau and others located on the edges of the peninsula complete the topographical analysis. There are two depressions the Ebro and Guadalquivir river valleys located between the Meseta and the peripheral ranges. The natural fluvial regime of Spain's rivers mainly depends on the pattern of precipitation, where its waters originate and transform into surface water or groundwater runoff.

However, this natural fluvial pattern is affected by human action in the form of infrastructures used to regulate and modify its temporal distribution, as well as other types of actions that remove volumes of water from rivers. The diversity of climates in Spain, together with other morphological and geological factors, explains the enormous contrasts in its present-day hydrographical composition.

Although the climates in Spain are difficult to classify because of their widely varying nature, it is possible to distinguish the following types:. Precipitation is also marked by sharp contrasts: the north and northwest, which are directly influenced by the Atlantic, have abundant rainfall and no distinguishable dry season. The remainder of the country is predominantly dry, with an annual precipitation of less than mm.

The southeast of Spain is semi-arid, with annual precipitation below mm and a semi-desert landscape that at times is reminiscent of the Sahara. Spain's rich diversity in terms of climate, petrography and topography has given rise to the formation of several clearly defined ecological regions, which in turn have led to the development of a broad spectrum of vegetation types.

Another influential factor is the intensity of human activity, which has gradually transformed our natural surroundings since the Neolithic period, often adding to the already diverse array of habitats.

Under natural conditions, virtually the entire country would be covered by forests; only a few enclaves in the highest mountains and certain extremely dry areas in the southeast and in the Canary Islands do not lend themselves to the natural development of this type of vegetation.

Nowadays, however, the vegetation cover in Spain resembles a type of mosaic in which the natural formations of trees, shrubs and herbaceous plants are distributed unevenly throughout the land alongside crop fields and reforested areas. This varied landscape is clearly reflected in the equally varied flora, which comprises approximately eight thousand species and includes plants from the whole of Europe and North Africa.

Hence, the European beech co-exists with the Mediterranean holm oak, Aleppo pine, African palm and even the Australian eucalyptus. The plateau is mostly covered with dry grasslands, olive groves and forested hills. Madrid is situated in the middle of the Meseta, at an elevation of meters 2, feet. Rising to about 2, meters 8, feet , these mountains display some glacial features and are snow-capped for most of the year. Offering almost year-round winter sports, the mountains are also important to the climate of Madrid.