When to use 'the' to talk about places - English In A Minute

Today, we look at geographic features, and

why some don't use any article, and others

use the definite article 'the'.

Usually, we don't use the with names. That's

why we don't need to use 'the' before the

names of:

Lakes: 'I live near Lake Como.'

Mountains: 'I visited Mont Blanc last year.'

Cities: 'I went to Tokyo last summer.'

Islands: I really want to go to Cuba.

Continents: Asia is a huge continent.

We also don't use ‘the' with the names of

most countries.

'I love Spain.'

However, for countries which are plural nouns,

we need to use ‘the'.

'I flew to the Netherlands.'

And for countries which contain words like 'states',

‘kingdom' or ‘republic', we use 'the'.

'I visited the United States last year.'

'I live in the United Kingdom.'

You know what, I'd love to visit the US again. Bye!