North Fork Payette River
The North Fork Payette River is a river in western Idaho in the United States. It flows about southwards from the Salmon River Mountains to near Banks, where it empties into the Payette River, a tributary of the Snake River. It drains a watershed of , consisting of mountains and forests, and valleys filled with large lakes and wetlands. Course. It rises at the confluence of Trail Creek and Cloochman Creek, in a meadow in the Payette National Forest in Valley County. The river flows south into Upper Payette Lake then further south through a narrow valley  into Payette Lake. The river exits from the southern end of the lake at McCall and flows southwards through Long Valley into Lake Cascade, a large reservoir formed by Cascade Dam. The Lake Fork and Gold Fork rivers join from the north and east sides of the lake. About below the Cascade Dam and the town of Cascade the North Fork reaches the end of Long Valley and enters a narrow canyon along the western side of the North Fork Range in the Boise National Forest. Paralleled by Idaho State Highway 55, it crosses into Boise County. At the county  line, the canyon is more than deep. The North Fork joins with the Payette River near the village of Banks, at an elevation of . From there, the Payette River flows further west to its confluence with the Snake River near Ontario, Oregon.