Mexico: Physical Geography

Mexico occupies the southern portion of North America, stretching roughly 2,000 miles from its border with the United States to its southeastern frontier with Guatemala and Belize. Bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and south and by the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea to the east, the country covers nearly 2 million square kilometers and includes more than 9,000 kilometers of coastline. Much of the interior is dominated by highland terrain: twin mountain ranges, the Sierra Madre Occidental and the Sierra Madre Oriental, flank a broad interior tableland known as the Mexican Plateau, which rises gradually from north to south and holds most of the country's major cities, including Mexico City.

A volcanic belt known as the Cordillera Neo-Volcanica, or Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt, crosses the country from coast to coast near its narrowest point and contains some of its most prominent landmarks. Pico de Orizaba, a dormant volcano within this range, reaches 5,610 meters and is the highest point in the country as well as the third-highest peak in North America. Nearby stand Popocatepetl, an active volcano, and Iztaccihuatl. Farther southeast, the limestone Yucatan Peninsula presents a markedly different landscape: low, porous terrain riddled with caverns and sinkholes known as cenotes, with little surface drainage.

Mexico sits at the junction of several tectonic plates, including the North American, Cocos, Pacific, and Caribbean plates, making it one of the more seismically active countries in the Americas; a major earthquake struck central Mexico in 1985. Surface water is distributed unevenly across the country's roughly 150 rivers. The Lerma-Santiago system feeds Lake Chapala, the nation's largest natural lake, while the Usumacinta, Grijalva, Papaloapan, Coatzacoalcos, and Panuco rivers, which empty into the Gulf of Mexico, together carry more than half of Mexico's average annual surface water volume.