 As its name suggests, most of the department is a constituent part of the overall topographic Alps – including the Maritime Alps – but it also has the distinction of being a coastal district with its Mediterranean coast.The coastal area, urbanized and densely populated (shaded in red on the map), includes all the cities in an almost continuous conurbation from Cannes to Menton, while the larger but sparsely populated mountainous area (light green) is fully rural with the exception of the three large resorts of Valberg (created in 1936), Auron (created in 1937), and Isola 2000 (created in 1971).The highest point of the department is the Cime du Gélas () on the Franco-Italian border which dominates the Vallée des Merveilles further east.