Countries of Europe

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Two twins: Slovakia and Slovenia. Only SloVENia gets to visit Venice, because she has a tiny nose that just touches the Adriatic sea. Her home city is full of love: Ljubljana, where "ljub" means love.

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A giant CROissant curls around the top and side of Bosnia, its tip dipping into the Adriatic. Spotted Dalmatian dogs in neckties run up and down the croissant's long coastal edge.

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A huge bunch of grapes, shaped just like the country, is squeezed between Romania and Ukraine. Some of the grapes have gone MOLDY ("mol-DOH-va"). A cat in the capital sneezes: "KEE-shee-NOW!"

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A giant leather BOOT wades into the Mediterranean, its toe about to kick a rocky football: the island of Sicily. Up at the top of the boot's shin, a Roman centurion is ROAMING around in circles.

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At the very western edge of Europe, a sailor stands in the last PORT before the open Atlantic. He tries to shout goodbye, but he has a LISP: "LISP-BON voyage!"

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A Viking tries to sail straight along the coast, but every few metres the sea cuts deep into the cliffs. "NOR WAY through!" he groans, and rows so slowly his crew sing "Oh, SLO-w."

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On an island of ice and volcanoes, steam rises from hot springs all around a little bay. A Viking wrinkles his nose: "It REEKS!" So he names the place REEK-ya-vik, "smoky bay", the most northern capital on Earth.

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On a green island west of Britain, a Viking peers into a BLACK POOL where a river meets the sea. In Irish that's "DUBH LINN", and the town that grew around it is DUBLIN.

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A giant HAND reaches down into the Mediterranean, fingers splayed, with thousands of islands scattered like spilled olives. In its palm stands the goddess ATHENA, guarding her city: ATHENS.

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ALL BANANAS! A Balkan queen stands on the coast just across a narrow strait from Italy's heel, wearing a sparkling TIARA ("ti-RAH-na") made of bananas.

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A huge BLACK MOUNTAIN looms over the Adriatic: "monte NEGRO", black mountain. At its foot a gardener pulls up a POD of peas that GORGEs on rich soil: Pod-GOR-itsa.

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A waiter SERVES ("SERB-ia") two rivers on a tray: the Sava and the mighty Danube, poured together into a gleaming WHITE castle city. "Your BELL, sir, is GRAND": Bel-GRADE.

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A strong man with BULGING muscles ("BULG-aria") lounges on the Black Sea beach. He carries a comfy SOFA inland, where his friend SOFIA flops down on it.

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The Carpathian Mountains curl around like an arm hugging a dark forest: Transylvania, where Dracula ROAMS ("ROAM-ania"). Exhausted, he's BOOKED A REST in the capital: BUCHA-REST.

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A HUNGRY river, the Danube, flows between two towns: hilly BUDA on one bank and flat PEST on the other. In 1873 the river gulps them both down into one city: BUDAPEST.

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A tourist arrives in the Alps looking for kangaroos and is told: "No, no: this is AUSTRIA, no -ALIA!" To cheer up, he eats a VIENNA sausage while a waltz plays.

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In the snowy Alps, a cuckoo clock strikes noon and a BEAR pops out instead of a bird. Everyone expects the capital to be busy Zurich or Geneva, but the bear growls: "It's BERN!"

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A tiny prince lives in a LIGHT STONE castle ("LIKHT-en-shtine") squeezed between Switzerland and Austria. To reach the sea he'd have to cross two whole countries. His only rival: a man in Uzbekistan with the same problem.

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A LUXURY castle ("LUX-embourg") sits on a cliff between Belgium, France and Germany. Inside, a very GRAND DUKE sits on a velvet throne, the last one left in the world.

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A BELL rings ("BEL-gium") and diplomats from all over Europe sit down to dinner. On every plate: a mountain of BRUSSELS sprouts.

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A great Danish thumb, the Jutland peninsula, sticks up out of Germany, pointing north. On an island just off it, a COPPER HEN lays shiny eggs: COPEN-HAGEN.

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Three Baltic sisters stand in a row, from north to south. The LITTLE one ("LITH-uania") is a joke: she's actually the biggest, at the bottom. She plays her VILLAIN role: VIL-nius.

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The middle Baltic sister stands with her arms around a deep gulf, where a huge oil RIG ("REE-ga") sits in the water. She LATCHES onto it ("LAT-via") so it can't float away.

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The top Baltic sister ESTablishes a TALL INN on the shore, so tall that guests on the roof can wave to Helsinki just across the Gulf of Finland.

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Landlocked Slovakia hosts a party in BRATISLAVA, a city full of rowdy BRATS. They're so loud that both neighbours knock at once: Austria on one side, Hungary on the other.

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Just south of Sicily, three little islands float in the Mediterranean like spilled MALTESERS. A smartly dressed VALET ("va-LET-a") parks the boats in the harbour.

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In the far eastern Mediterranean, a FRYING PAN with a long handle pointing at Syria floats on the waves. A CYPRESS tree grows from it, and a NICE chef named NICK ("Nick-oh-SEE-a") cooks there.

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In the middle of Rome, the Pope opens his front door, takes three steps and is already in another country. His whole kingdom fits inside the city walls, small enough to walk around before his VAT of tea goes cold.

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Four friends share one big umbrella off the northwest coast of Europe: England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It's raining, of course. They meet for tea under Big Ben in LONDON, where the rain goes "LON-DON, LON-DON" on the canvas.

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A huge field of golden wheat and sunflowers stretches across Eastern Europe, the biggest farm on the continent. In the middle, a baker shouts "KEEV!" as he pulls a loaf from his Kyiv oven, right beside the wide Dnipro river.

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In Scandinavia, a giant hops across fourteen stepping-stone islands, each one STOCKED with flat-pack furniture: the city of STOCK-holm. Behind him, the long country stretches up toward the Arctic.

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A bull stands dead in the centre of the Iberian Peninsula, and he's MAD: everyone keeps waving red capes at him. So they build a capital right where he stands: MAD-rid.

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In the hills of northern Italy, a TITAN sits on a mountaintop wearing three stone towers as a crown. A SAINT in a MARINE uniform guards his ancient republic, which he's run since the year 301.

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Stretching from Europe all the way to the Pacific, the biggest country on Earth has eleven alarm clocks going off one after another, all night long. At the western end, a sleepy cow in MOSS-covered boots says "MOSS-COW" and goes back to bed.

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On the flat plains of Central Europe, a lumberjack drags a giant WAR SAW along the banks of the VISTULA river, cutting the country's capital out of the forest: WARSAW.

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Windmills pump and pump to keep the sea out, because a quarter of this flat country lies NETHER, meaning below, the waterline. A bored boy plugs a leak in the dyke with his finger and shouts: "I AM STERDAM!"

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On the French Riviera, Formula 1 cars scream round a country so small the track is most of it. A gambler in a tuxedo shouts "MONEY! CAR-LOW!" as he loses his car at the Monte Carlo casino.

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In the landlocked Balkans, a sign painter adds one word, NORTH, to the old MACEDONIA sign in 2019, settling a long row with Greece next door. Then he goes SKATING, "SKOP-yeh!", on the river in Skopje.

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In the heart of Europe, a crowd of people, the most in any EU country, packs in around a big BEAR waving from the Brandenburg Gate. He's the mascot of BEAR-lin.

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In Western Europe, a giant hexagon-shaped cheese board sits between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. Right at the top, a waiter balances a PAIR of baguettes beside the Eiffel Tower: PAIR-is.

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Between Sweden and Russia, the land is speckled with so many lakes that a fish with a FIN can swim from one end of the country to the other. On the southern coast, a sweaty man runs from a sauna yelling "HELL'S SINKY!" and jumps into the icy sea at Helsinki.

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A guard stands on a stone bridge lined with statues in the middle of landlocked Central Europe, CHECKing every passer-by. Asked where he is, he snaps "PRAGUE, of course," and points at the river below.

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A heart-shaped country in the Balkans is surrounded by Croatia, except for one tiny window: a 20 km strip of Adriatic beach at Neum. Inland, a sorry chef keeps burning dinner and apologising: "SARA, I'M SORRY" in Sarajevo.

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A landlocked forest between Poland and Russia is full of white fur: BELA means white, so it's "White Rus". In the middle, a small white MINK runs the capital: MINSK.

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High in the Pyrenees between France and Spain, a skier squeezes into a tiny country. He looks up at Europe's highest capital, over 1,000 m up, and sighs at the climb: "AND OR-RA? LA VELLA..." in Andorra la Vella.