Continental Divide

Continental Divide (also called the Great Divide), ridge of mountains in North America, separating the streams that flow west (into the Pacific Ocean) from those that flow east (into the Atlantic Ocean and its marginal seas). Most of the divide follows the crest of the Rocky Mountains. It extends from Alaska in the United States into the Yukon Territory and British Columbia in Canada and forms part of the border between British Columbia and Alberta, also in Canada. It then passes through Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and New Mexico in the United States and continues south into Mexico and Central America along the crest of the Sierra Madre Occidental. The term continental divide may be applied to the principal watershed boundary of any continent.