Chinchaga River Chinchaga River Chinchaga is a river in north-western Alberta. It is a tributary of the Hay River. Through the Hay River, its waters are carried to the Arctic Ocean via Great Slave Lake and Mackenzie River. The name Chinchaga is First Nations, and means "Big Wood River". Much of the Chinchaga watershed burned in 1950 during the Chinchaga fire. Chinchaga River originates in the Chinchaga Lakes, a series of small lakes in the muskeg of north-eastern British Columbia, at an elevation of 795 m. It flows east into Alberta, then continues north-east until west of Keg River, where it turns
Mackenzie River north towards the Arctic. It flows through open taiga with its wide valley bounded, on the west, by the Mackenzie Mountains and to the east by low hills of the Canadian Shield. This mostly uninhabited area is called the Mackenzie Lowlands; although partly forested, it is mostly covered by large areas of muskeg, swamps and many small lakes. A number of major tributaries join from the west, including the Root River, Redstone River and Keele River. Below the Keele River, the Mackenzie River flows north along the western base of the Franklin Mountains before turning northwest, and receives the Great