Guess Where I Was Today

[yogi]

Reading what is being posted here makes me realize how little of the world I've see first hand. Perhaps I forgot a lot of what I did, but I do know my family did not travel much. I can claim to have traversed the Continental Divide. We did it on the trip I took with my neighbor when I was about 16 years old. Somewhere up in the Rocky Mountains along Rt 66 is a sign that announces the location of the Continental Divide. The scenery was very unremarkable as I recall but I did know it was a significant event. The whole episode lasted less than 30 seconds from when I saw the sign until the time we passed it. It was all downhill from there.

[ocelotl]

Reading what is being posted here makes me realize how little of the world I've see first hand. Perhaps I forgot a lot of what I did, but I do know my family did not travel much. I can claim to have traversed the Continental Divide. We did it on the trip I took with my neighbor when I was about 16 years old. Somewhere up in the Rocky Mountains along Rt 66 is a sign that announces the location of the Continental Divide. The scenery was very unremarkable as I recall but I did know it was a significant event. The whole episode lasted less than 30 seconds from when I saw the sign until the time we passed it. It was all downhill from there.

I see what you did there...

As you well know Mexico City lies on a closed valley on what is geologically the southernmost tip of the Rockies continuation... Only that in this country it transforms to the Mexican Central Plateau surrounded by the Sierra Madre Oriental, the Sierra Madre Occidental and the Neovolcanic Axis.

Almost all travels outside of the Mexico Valley can be considered to be traversing the Continental Divide. The only ways out that are not (very) mountanous is to the North and to the Northeast, when travelling to Toluca, Cuernavaca and Puebla you have to climb to over 3,000 meters asl to get out of the valley. All the pine, oak and oyamel woods in the mountains surprise many visitors that expect rolling weeds all over Mexico. In a way it can be claimed that the Mexican Central Plateau is indeed at the top of the Continental Divide... Only that down here it is not a thing nor many people is aware of it, as I've read to be in the US states of New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming and Montana.

Down in Costa Rica, as I've been told, they consider that apart of the volcanoes there, the chain that traverses Central America form Mexico to Colombia to be the backbone of all Central America.

[yogi]

ocelotl

As you well know Mexico City lies on a closed valley on what is geologically the southernmost tip of the Rockies continuation

I may have known that, but I don't recall knowing it. LOL It makes sense that there should be a terminal end of the mountains but I never gave much thought to where it might be. Mexico City being located at the union of three tectonic plates would seem as if it is in a very precarious position. Some day the earth may open up and swallow the entire city. If that did happen, it probably would be on the same day that the state of California broke away from the rest of the united states and was put adrift in the Pacific Ocean. You are right to point out that not many people think or know about the structure of the land masses. The Continental Divide has not come up in conversation recently and now I'm wondering how many people here actually know about it.