Geography of Honduras

Honduras is a country situated in Central America. Honduras borders the Caribbean Sea and the North Pacific Ocean. Guatemala lies to the west, Nicaragua south east and El Salvador to the south west. It is the second largest Central American republic. The triangular-shaped country has a total area of just over 43,000 square miles (110,000 km²). The 700-kilometers northern boundary is the Caribbean coast extending from the mouth of the Río Motagua on the west to the mouth of the Río Coco on the east, at Cape Gracias a Dios. The 922-kilometer southeastern side of the triangle is the land border with Nicaragua; it follows the Río Coco near the Caribbean Sea and then extends southwestward through mountainous terrain to the Gulf of Fonseca on the Pacific Ocean. The southern apex of the triangle is a 153- kilometer coastline at the Gulf of Fonseca, which opens onto the Pacific Ocean. The western land boundary consists of the 342-kilometer border with El Salvador and the 256-kilometer border with Guatemala
Honduras controls a number of islands as part of its offshore territories. In the Caribbean Sea, the islands of Roatán (Isla de Roatán), Utila, and Guanaja together form Islas de la Bahía (Bay Islands), one of the eighteen departments into which Honduras is divided. Roatán, the largest of the three islands, is fifty kilometers long by five kilometers wide. The Islas de la Bahía archipelago also has a number of smaller islands, among them the islets of Barbareta (Isla Barbareta), Santa Elena (Isla Santa Elena), and Morat (Isla Morat). Farther out in the Caribbean are the Islas Santanillas, formerly known as Swan Islands. A number of small islands and keys can be found nearby, among them Cayos Zapotillos and Cayos Cochinos. In the Gulf of Fonseca, the main islands under Honduran control are El Tigre, Zacate Grande (Isla Zacate Grande), and Exposición (Isla Exposición).

The smallest physiographic region of Honduras, the Pacific lowlands, is a strip of land averaging twenty-five kilometers wide on the north shore of the Gulf of Fonseca. The land is flat, becoming swampy near the shores of the gulf, and is composed mostly of alluvial soils washed down from the mountains. The gulf is shallow and the water rich in fish and mollusks. Mangroves along the shore make shrimp and shellfish particularly abundant by providing safe and abundant breeding areas amid their extensive networks of underwater roots.
Several islands in the gulf fall under Honduras's jurisdiction. The two largest, Zacate Grande and El Tigre, are eroded volcanoes, part of the chain of volcanoes that extends along the Pacific coast of Central America. Both islands have volcanic cones more than 700 meters in elevation that serve as markers for vessels entering Honduras's Pacific.
Moreover, it contains Interior high lands and Carribean lowlands.