Continental Divide

How to get there: The Continental Divide marker is approximately two miles west of Browns Valley on Highway 28/7.

What you will find: A wayside rest offers information about this high point between two watersheds.

Services at this site: None

The city of Browns Valley is located along the Laurentian Continental Divide, where theoretically, a raindrop could split on Browns Valley’s main street and half of it would flow north to the Hudson Bay and half south to the Gulf of Mexico.

At 977 feet above sea level, Browns Valley, located in a deep valley, happens to be on a small rise of ten feet which is enough to make the Continental Divide. Lake Traverse drains north into the Red River and on into the Hudson Bay while Big Stone Lake flows south by way of the Minnesota and Mississippi River and on to the Gulf of Mexico. There have been times during floods when the two lakes have temporarily been joined.