[1] The river starts at Lake Désert and flows in a northeasterly direction.

It turns south near the northern boundary of the municipality of Montcerf-Lytton, meandering for more than 40 kilometres (25 mi).

It was named "Désert" (French for "desert") due to a natural clearing or man-made vacant land along its banks near its mouth at the Gatineau River.

The Hudson's Bay Company built a trading post on this spot in 1838, followed by an Oblate mission in the 1840s, which formed into a settlement called Notre-Dame-du-Désert in 1849 (now known as Maniwaki).

[2][3] The Désert River overflowed its banks and caused flooding in 1974, mid 1990's, and 2017, requiring evacuations in Maniwaki.