What does Australia's Great Dividing Range divide?

It divides (and protects) me from the A2K wabbit! Otherwise I'd be living in fear!

The Great Dividing Range runs like a spine inland from the east coast of Australia

Not everything to the west of it is the outback - only the outback parts. The rainfall is higher on the eastern side, while to the west there are more water shortages, rivers running dry. We've all been in drought for many a year now - with only occasional relief.

To the west there are hundreds and hundreds of miles of plains, farming and grazing land, before you get to what could possibly be called the outback - and then there's the same sort of distances heading towards the west coast.

The outback, although quite a large area - is only a small part of Australia.

Australia is roughly the same size as mainland USA - but without the population.

Why do you ask?

Which side of the Great Divide does the Outback Steakhouse originate from?

Quincy, Massachusetts.

I guess I failed Australia geography since a simple Google search claims that the Outback Steakhouse was founded in South Tampa, Florida.

MA's probably exactly right (as you'd expect!) - until recently we didn't have them here! I don't think the couple here are related to the US chain.

Well - I supose Tampa, Florida (or even Quincy, Mass.,) could be considered far west from here - how far west until it becomes far east?

Everything margo said is good and factual but I would like to add something. It is called the Dividing Range because in the colonial days people from Melbourne in the south could venture north behind it which was very dangerous to go so far from civilisation, but people in Sydney could'nt go west. Near Sydney the range turns into a maze. It has cliff faces hundreds of feet high which may as well be thousands of feet because of the difficulty they present to travel. Travelling in the valleys was attempted and although you have access to water you cant see where the best direction is. Travelling on top of the ridges was the only way to go and this was literally one of those puzzles where you draw a way to the exit. Eventually an Aboriginal showed them the solution to the maze, and the Divideing range was travelled by settlers.

The south island has active volcanic activity and glaciers. It also has taller mountains and a unique feature for flying - the wind blowing over the mountains from west to east creates some quite spectacular cloud as it billows over the range, looking like a waterfall and making flying very hazardous. It also has fjords, remnants of older glaciers.

read: b-o-r-i-n-g!

i liked what you wrote

especially the part about the wabbit, scary

His first thought after that was, "Bloody hell, what have I done!?

Which is probably why it took so long to find an Aboriginee to do it. But history of course recorded the 3 white idiots to whom he showed the way and his name was almost lost in time.

East is from Greenwich travelling east to the Date Line in the Pacific. West is from Greenwhich travelling west to the Pacific. These are called the Eastern and Western Hemispheres. So from Oz we would travel east across the date line in the Pacific as it would be about 4,000 miles shorter.

Strange...thats the part I didnt like for the exact same reason.

When you're talking about distances that great, Quincy, Mass. and Tampa, Fla. are practically the same thing.

Would you say it's roughly 1000 miles or 1700 kilometers from Australia to New Zealand?

That has NOTHING to do with Australia@@@!!!!

You don't know the half of it.

To be technical, it is the same range from Antartica to SE Asia. So it is rather long.

Nah! It's just across the ditch! and that's kilometres!