​Greece is a country in Southeast Europe. Greece consists of a mountainous, peninsular mainland jutting out into the sea at the southern end of the Balkans, ending at the Peloponnese peninsula (separated from the mainland by the canal of the Isthmus of Corinth). Due to its highly indented coastline and numerous islands, Greece has the 11th longest coastline in the world with 13.676 km.

Greece features a vast number of islands, between 1.200 and 6.000, depending on the definition, 227 of which are inhabited. Crete is the largest and most populous of the islands.

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Eighty percent of Greece consists of mountains or hills, making the country one of the most mountainous in Europe.Mount Olympus, the mythical abode of the Greek Gods, culminates at Mytikas peak 2.917 m, the highest in the country.​

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The climate of Greece is primarily Mediterranean, featuring mild, wet winters and hot, dry summers. This climate occurs at all coastal locations, including Athens, Crete and the central continental region. The Pindus mountain range strongly affects the climate of the country, as areas to the west of the range are considerably wetter on average (due to greater exposure to south-westerly systems bringing in moisture) than the areas lying to the east of the range (due to a rain shadow effect).​

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The mountainous areas of Northwestern Greece, as well as in the mountainous central parts of Peloponnese, feature an Alpine climate with heavy snowfalls. The inland parts of northern Greece feature a temperate climate with cold, damp winters and hot, dry summers with frequent thunderstorms. Snowfalls occur every year in the mountains and northern areas, and brief snowfalls are not unknown even in low-lying southern areas, such as Athens.

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The plant communities of the Balkan region show as great a variety and complexity as any in Europe. They range from the high alpine vegetation of the mountain peaks, through dense central European forests of fir and beech, to the evergreen woods of the Mediterranean and the scorched dry phrygrana of the Greek islands. With two such contrasting types of climate as the Mediterranean and the central European, with its intervening transitional zone, a great variety of local climates is developed. This, coupled with wide differences in bedrock formation, altitude and aspect, as well as the varied origin of species, all makes for a great diversity in the plant communities.

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A climate of hot dry rainless summers and mild and wet winters and early springs constitutes de  overriding influence affecting the vegetation surrounding the Mediterranean Sea and gives its distinctive composition and appearence. The predominance of evergreen trees and shrubs, the abundance of small, often grey-leaved aromatic shrubs, the short-lived flush of brightly coloured annuals and bulbous plants in  the spring, followed by another flush when the rains return in early winter - these features clearly distinguish the Mediterranean vegetation from all other types in Europe.