Our zendo's name refers most directly to the great Kennebec River, about a mile to the east. The Algonquin word Kennebec means 'long wide water.' The region has been inhabited for about 9,000 years and in Wabinaki Indian times Kennebec referred only to the lower 50 miles or so, from modern Augusta--the head of navigation--to the river's mouth on the Gulf of Maine. Today's "Kennebec River" includes another 140 miles to the river's origin at Moosehead Lake.

The Kennebec--along with the near-by Androscoggin River, flowing into the Kennebec at Merry Meeting Bay--is a grand artery of life, communication, and history. Of course, "river" and "vein" both have many metaphorical meanings in Buddhism as well.

Sabino Road in West Bath, where the zendo is located, was named for Sabinoah, an influential Wabinaki sachem on the lower Kennebec and along the New Meadows River. The New Meadows is a tidal fjord half a mile west of the zendo