A sugar maple and American elm forest grows in the gorge and has remained largely undisturbed for hundreds of years.

It winds first towards the north-east, towards the east, then towards the south-east, in a narrow and deep glacial valley, for 161 kilometers and a drop of 820 meters.

Its course forms a semicircle stretching towards the north and completely encircling in its center the hydrographic slope of the Rivière du Gouffre.

For example, there is a distance of 17.1 kilometres (10.6 mi) between the mouth of the rivières des Martres and the mouth of a stream flowing on the east bank of the upper part of the Malbaie River; at the height of this imaginary line, the course of the Malbaie river stretches north to 10.9 kilometres (6.8 mi).

Designated a national park (of the province of Québec) in 2000, the 233-km2 Hautes-Gorges is the centrepiece of the UNESCO Charlevoix biosphere reserve.

[1] Champlain calls the bay "Malbaie" in the sense of bad because at low tide the latter dries up and the boats run aground.