Canyon Glacier is a narrow glacier

Glacier

A glacier is a large persistent body of ice that forms where the accumulation of snow exceeds its ablation over many years, often centuries. At least 0.1 km² in area and 50 m thick, but often much larger, a glacier slowly deforms and flows due to stresses induced by its weight...

, 35 miles (56.3 km) long, flowing to the Ross Ice Shelf

Ross Ice Shelf

The Ross Ice Shelf is the largest ice shelf of Antarctica . It is several hundred metres thick. The nearly vertical ice front to the open sea is more than 600 km long, and between 15 and 50 metres high above the water surface...

. It drains the northwest slopes of Mount Wexler and moves northward between steep canyon walls of the Separation Range

Separation Range

Separation Range is the Commonwealth Range branches at about 8420S and forms two chains of mountains separated by Hood Glacier. The Separation Range, about 30 nautical miles long, is the eastern branch and terminates to the north at Ross Ice Shelf. Named by the New Zealand Alpine Club Antarctic...

 and Hughes Range

Hughes Range (Antarctica)

The Hughes Range is a high massive north-south trending mountain range in Antarctica, surmounted by six prominent summits, of which Mount Kaplan is the highest...

 to join the ice shelf immediately west of Giovinco Ice Piedmont

Giovinco Ice Piedmont

Giovinco Ice Piedmont is an ice piedmont, 10 nautical miles wide, between Canyon Glacier and Perez Glacier, gradually descending north to the Ross Ice Shelf. Named by Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names for F.A. Giovinco, Master of the USNS Pvt. John R. Towle during U.S. Navy Operation...

. The glacier was observed from nearby Mount Patrick

Mount Patrick

Mount Patrick is a massive largely ice-covered mountain in the Commonwealth Range, rising to 2,380 m just east of Wedge Face on the east side of the Beardmore Glacier. Discovered and named by the British Antarctic Expedition, 1907-09....

 by the New Zealand Alpine Club Antarctic Expedition (1959–60) who gave the descriptive name.