Flow gently, sweet Mojave--

Mojave River, in Afton Canyon, Mojave desert, California. Even tho the river is usually dry thru here, the shallow bedrock locally forces water to the surface, where it is of disproportionate importance to wildlife. The area also illustrates the hodgepodge of Hispanic, Native American, and Anglo-Celtic-North European names so typical of California and the US West generally. "Mojave" is a Hispanicized spelling of the local Native American tribe. "Afton" canyon obviously has little to do with the original river in Scotland; evidently it was named after a nearby, now-deserted watering stop on the Union Pacific Railroad. Per Wikipedia, FWIW, Robert Burns's poem led to a number of places being named "Afton" in the US.