What is Continental Divide?

A continental divide is a topographic feature separating streams that flow towards opposite sides of a continent.

A continental divide is a line of terrain, often elevated, which forms a border between two watersheds such that water falling on one side of the line eventually travels to one ocean or body of water, and water on the other side travels to another, generally on the opposite side of the continent. Because the exact border between bodies of water is usually not clearly defined, the continental divide is not always definite for any continent.

Moreover, on each continent there are endorheic basins where rivers drain inward and do not flow into the oceans. Where a continental divide meets one of these, such as the Great Divide Basin of Wyoming, the continental divide splits and encircles the basin.

In North America, the Western Continental Divide is an imaginary line that sits atop a continuous ridge of mountain summits that divide the continent into two main drainage areas. It runs from northwestern Canada, south along the crests of the Rocky Mountains in the United States, then on into Mexico, where it follows the peaks of the Sierra Madre Occidental (mountains). Water in streams to the west of the continental divide flows toward the Pacific Ocean. The east of the continental divide flows toward the Atlantic Ocean. In Alaska, however, the continental divide marks the boundary between rivers flowing north and west to the Arctic Ocean and those flowing south and west into the Bering Sea. Continental divides are often associated with mountainous terrain.

Rain or melting snow on one side (via rivers and streams) flows west to the Pacific Ocean; on the other side, rivers and streams flow northeast to Hudson Bay, Canada, or southeast to the Gulf of Mexico.

The Eastern Continental Divide runs along the high ridges and peaks of the Appalachian Mountains, and it separates land draining east to the Atlantic Ocean from that draining west and southwest to the Mississippi River, and the Gulf of Mexico.

Every continent except Antarctica has a continental divide, and like North America, a few have more than one. In South America, the Continental Divide lies along the Andes Mountains.
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For more details go to:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Continental_divide