Lake Kenozero

Lake Kenozero lies among wooded hills and wetlands on the watershed between the Baltic and White Sea basins. Its shores and islands supported a landscape of small villages, fields and chapels. To the north-west, the Kensky portage connected waterways leading from Novgorod toward the Onega and Pomorye. This route remained important to travellers heading for Kargopol and the northern lands until the end of the seventeenth century. The lake’s fish and forests drew settlers into a region where water and land routes met.