File:Little Colorado River Gorge, Arizona (14518443003).jpg

The Little Colorado River is a river in the U.S. state of Arizona, providing the principal drainage from the Painted Desert region. Together with its major tributary, the Puerco River, it drains an area of about 26,500 square miles (69,000 km2) in eastern Arizona and western New Mexico. This Colorado River tributary is over 315 miles (507 km) long, but being a transient desert river, its average discharge is typically less than 400 cubic feet per second (11 m3/s), and can vary greatly throughout the year.

It then passes Joseph City and crosses the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad, now winding north into Coconino County. Now an ephemeral wash, the river passes into the Navajo Indian Reservation, and drops over the 185-foot (56 m) Grand Falls of the Little Colorado shortly after. Grand Falls marks the beginning of a deep, jagged canyon that soon turns into a wide valley between low bluffs, before transforming into a gorge for the final time near Cameron. From there, the Little Colorado River carves deeper and deeper into the Colorado Plateau, growing in size as it receives water from numerous springs in the canyon walls. The canyon spreads wider as the river runs farther north, becoming an arm of the Grand Canyon, then the river merges with the Colorado deep inside the Grand Canyon, miles from any major settlement.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Colorado_River