Continental Divide of The Northern Americas

Continental Divide Of The Northern Americas

The Continental Divide of the Americas, or merely the Continental Gulf of Division or Great Divide, is the name given to the principal, and largely mountainous, hydrological divide of the Americas, that is, the continental divide that separates the watersheds that drain into the Pacific Ocean from (1) those river systems that drain into the Atlantic Ocean (including those that drain into the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea), and (2) along the northernmost reaches of the Divide, those river systems that drain into the Arctic Ocean.

There are many other hydrological divides in the Americas, however the Great Divide is by far the most prominent of these because it tends to follow a line of high peaks along the main ranges of the Rocky Mountains and Andes, at a generally much higher elevation than the other divides.

Read more about Continental Divide Of The Northern Americas:  Geography, Exceptions

Famous quotes containing the words divide, northern and/or americas:

    You can’t divide a business like a sack of apples.
    Edward L. Bernds (b. 1911)

    [During the Renaissance] the Italians said, “We are one in the Father: we will go back.” The Northern races said, “We are one in Christ, we will go on.”
    —D.H. (David Herbert)

    The only history is a mere question of one’s struggle inside oneself. But that is the joy of it. One need neither discover Americas nor conquer nations, and yet one has as great a work as Columbus or Alexander, to do.
    —D.H. (David Herbert)