30 Geography Facts Most People get lost

we're about to tell you may already know however for the average joe who isn't too intrigued by geography a lot of them might get these facts wrong hey guys some here from the geography bible .

1- the united kingdom and great britain are not the same thing great britain is the official collective name of england scotland and wales and their associated islands it does not include northern ireland and therefore should never be used interchangeably with the uk something you see all too often .

2- holland and the netherlands are two separate things the netherlands is the term for the country as a whole twelve provinces while holland refers to just the two provinces of north and south holland .

3- toronto isn't the capital of canada it is actually vancouver just kidding it's ottawa .

4- iceland isn't actually made of ice icelandic landscapes are shaped by the forces of nature and vary from deep fjords to vast volcanic deserts through to black sand beaches snow-capped mountains and staggering waterfalls .

5- iran isn't actually hot all of the time in january and february iran can see temperatures as low as four degrees celsius .

6- greenland isn't as big as it looks on a map greenland is astronomically distorted on a traditional map and is actually a lot smaller than what it appears it is still huge however .

7- rio isn't the capital of brazil it had been the federal capital of the south american country from 1822 until 1960. but today the capital of brazil is actually brasilia in the central plateau of the country .

8- texas isn't the largest state texas is approximately 678 000 squared kilometers while alaska is around 1.5 million squared kilometers so around double .

9- mount everest isn't technically the tallest mountain in the world ecuador's mount chimborazo protrudes further out due to it being closer to the equator mount everest is the tallest by height by sea level .

10- johannesburg is not the capital of south africa and neither is just cape town it is in fact bloomfontaine pretoria and cape town .

11-antarctica is actually the driest continent on earth not africa a desert is defined as a dry area that has very little rainfall given this antarctica is actually the largest desert in the world .

12- brazil is larger than the continental us although the us is the fourth largest country in the world and brazil is fifth that's mostly because of us territories .

13- sydney is not the capital of australia although it is the most populated and arguably iconic city in australia its capital is canberra .

14- the pyramids of giza aren't in the middle of the desert many people assume that a visit to the pyramids of giza requires a long trek into the egyptian desert when in fact it's quite an easy trip from the cairo city center .

15- istanbul is not the capital of turkey although it is their most popular and iconic city the capital is in fact ankara .

16- the atlantic ocean isn't actually the largest body of water on earth but in fact the pacific ocean is actually the largest body of water in the world .

17- norway has the second most coastline in the world most people would assume a gigantic country like australia the us or russia may have the second most coastline behind canada when in fact it is nowhere .

18- java is the most populated island in the world at around 150 million java is by far the most populated island in the world home to indonesia's mega city capital jakarta .

19- speaking of islands great britain is the third most populated island in the world little old great britain is in fact the third most populated island in the world at around 66 million inhabitants .

20- greenland is the largest island in the world not australia which is technically a continent an island is a mass of land that is both entirely surrounded by water and also smaller than a continent by that definition australia can't be an island because it's already a continent .

21- surname's official language is dutch not spanish or portuguese .

22- california is actually more populated than the entirety of canada .

23- spanish is the second most native spoken language in the world behind mandarin not english .

24- although the most populated country in the world china does not have a city in the top five most populated in the world .

25- now this one is insane north korea and finland are separated by just one country russia.

26- greenland is not an independent country greenland is an autonomous constitute country within the kingdom of denmark and though it does enjoy a great deal of self-governing it is not independent .

27- florida is not the closest state to africa now this one blew my mind it makes sense since florida is the southeastern state and cuts into the atlantic but it's not the case a small peninsula off the coast of maine known as qwadi head is a mere 3150 miles from morocco the closest point in florida to africa is 1 000 miles further .

28- mexico is technically not south of the us while it may seem a little counterintuitive 11 u.s states have land farther south than the most northern point in mexico in part of texas for example the u.s mexico border is better described as being off to the west .

29- afghanistan is geographically more in south asia than the middle east and is closer to mumbai than the likes of iraq or yemen .

30- egypt isn't only located in africa sure egypt is part of the african continent but it's technically considered to be a transcontinental country while the suez canal divides asia and africa there's actually a small peninsula in egypt that transcends the canal and tows the line between the two continents so there we have it 30 geography facts that most people get wrong again as we mentioned earlier if you love geography some of these may be basic knowledge but to the average person who doesn't study geography or enjoy it these might be brand new facts to them.