Gipuzkoa

Gipuzkoa (in Basque and also the official form since 2011; in Spanish: Guipúzcoa; French: Guipuscoa) is a province of Spain and a historical territory of the autonomous community of the Basque Country. Its capital city is Donostia-San Sebastián. Gipuzkoa shares borders with the French department of Pyrénées-Atlantiques at the northeast, with the province and autonomous community of Navarre at east, Biscay at west, Álava at southwest and the Bay of Biscay to its north. It is located at the easternmost extreme of the Cantabric Sea, in the Bay of Biscay. It has 66 km of coast land.

With a total area of 1,980 square kilometers, Gipuzkoa is the smallest province of Spain. The province has 89 municipalities and a population of 715,148 inhabitants (2014), from which more than half live in the Donostia-San Sebastián metropolitan area. Apart from the capital, other important cities are Irun, Errenteria, Zarautz, Mondragón, Eibar, Hondarribia, Oñati, Tolosa, Beasain and Pasaia.

The oceanic climate gives the province an intense green color with little thermic oscillation. Gipuzkoa is the province of the Basque Country where the Basque language is most extensively used: 49.1% of the population speak Basque.