The Saco River is in northeastern New Hampshire and southwestern Maine. It drains a rural area of 1,703 square miles of forests and farmlands west and southwest of Portland, emptying into the Atlantic Ocean at Saco Bay, 136 miles from its source.[ It supplies drinking water to roughly 250,000 people in thirty-five towns, and historically provided transportation and water power encouraging the development of the cities of Biddeford and Saco and the towns of Fryeburg and Hiram. The name "Saco" comes from the Eastern Abenaki word, meaning "land where the river comes out".