The Alps are Europe's longest and highest mountains.

The Alps are made of ranges of mountains that curve right around the top of Italy. The forces of the weather, such as ice, frost and rainwater, have begun to wear them away. However, because the Alps are young mountains the peaks still stand as tall, dramatic mountains.

The Alps typically have deep, flat-floored valleys with steep sides and snow-covered peaks.

The Alps is the name of a region, or chain, of mountains that run east to west across the middle of Europe. They form an arc around the top of Italy. The Alps is just part of Europe’s main mountain chain. The whole chain is called the Alpine system and includes mountain chains such as the Carpathian Mountains in Eastern Europe.

The Alps are fold mountains, which means that they are made of part of the earth’s crust that has been crushed up into gigantic folds. Since it was formed into mountains it has been partly worn down by rivers and glaciers. There are no volcanoes in the Alps. Mont Blanc, 4,810m, is the highest summit in the Alps.

The Alps are tall mountains with many sharp peaks, called horns. The Matterhorn is the most famous of these.

The highest peaks remain snow-capped throughout the year and there are over 1200 glaciers (although most of them are small). The longest glacier is the Aletsch Glacier. The Alps have some of the most spectacularly deep valleys in the world. They were all scoured like this by glaciers in the Ice Age. There are also many hanging valleys and waterfalls. The Trummelbach Falls is one of the best known.