Europe Travel Forum

What are the best lakes in Europe?

1) small lakes, generally mountain lakes, with small hotels or pensions facing the lake, not crowded, no big resorts, good for unwinding;

2) large lakes with resorts on the sides, which resorts would you recommend for summer time, fun, boating, swimming;

3) large lakes with some quiet places around, which one would you recommend for relaxation, all seasons;

Large lakes: Como and Garda (Italy); there are more which I have not visited yet. Balaton (Hungary) and many small ones in Sweden. Lugano (very close to Como), Luzern, Leman (all three in Switzerland).

In south-west Germany
1) a very small lake,but very good for unwinding: Eiswoog in the Palatinate forest. The hotel and the restaurant are excellent. The website is German only.
http://www.haeckenhaus.de/index.html
2) Lake Constance, actually Germany, Switzerland and Austria
http://www.bodensee-info.com/html/lake_constance___bodensee_-_1_.html

In north-east Germany
3) the Müritz reagion, several larger and smaller lakes, all connected. Some fance hotels and lots of smaller B&Bs. Great for canoeing through the lakes and wonderful for bird-watching.But there are no montains nearby.
The website seems to be German only
http://www.mueritz.de/willkommen-38-13-2.html

1) Small lake:
- Wörthersee near Klagenfurt in Austria, surrounded by mountains, famous for the warm temperature of the water. I stayed in Pörtschach a small nice village. Here my notes, http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/bdaa0/4f320/

- Lake Bled in Slovenia: wonderful views, family run bed and breakfast, great food. I have been there in 2009 and have b&B and restaurant wrote down, not in VT yet, ask me in case you are interested, I will get my notebook out.

- Lake Bohini in Slovenia: wonderfil view, small lake. More expensive of lake Bled, they kind of set thinks up to make money from tourist but the area worth the pain. As for Bled I have infos on B&B and restaurants in case you need.

2+3) Large lake: Garda Lake in Italy have all you need. The busy, organized resort and also the quiet places. It all depend what you prefer.
The South and East parts are more suitable for beach fun, sunbathing, swimming, canoing, boat etc. Look up Sirmione, Desenzano, Lazise for big town, Garda, Bardolino for smaller resort.
The North part is more suitable for windsurging and sailing as the lake is more narrow and strong winds come down in the valley between the mountains. Smaller villages and mountain's look house style. Take a look here http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/bdaa0/262af/ and here http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/bdaa0/235d2/ for examples

The West part is more wild, dramatic road on top of high cliff, small romantic villages by the lake shore. http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/bdaa0/24c3d/ for some example.

I should mention the lakes I have visited and my favorites:

Austria: Wolfgangsee (my favorite), Attersee, Traunsee, Mondsee, Gossau (great), Zellersee, Hallstatersee (great);

Germany: Chiemsee, Konigsee (great), Bondensee

Switzerland: Luzernersee

Italy: Garda, Como

Great suggestions, thanks, keep them coming. Seems that I have to plan a visit to Germany and Slovenia

I have a suggestion for the 4th category: small lake with some quiet places around, which one would you recommend for relaxation, all seasons

Lago Bolsena in middle-western Italy. NW of Roma. It is a really relaxing little lake and I have several colleagues with kids who love to go there for their summer holidays.

And bookmark, too :-) I am looking for a nice lake for Easter holidays. Unfortunately there is a huge convention at Lake Constance/Bodensee at Easter and no more bed is available :-(

Oh yes, I forgot about Bolsena! also Trasimeno Lake is great on your forth category Trekki, and is a great base to visit Perugia, Gubbio, the Umbria region and the Arezzo area in Tuscany.

Yes, Orietta :-) And Lago Piediluco in ... is that still Umbria or already Lazio? I should know, was there... haha.

Lake Ohrid in Macedonia is really beautiful and I think it is one of the oldest tectonic lakes in Europe. Ohrid and the lake are an UNECSO World Heritage site as well...

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Ohrid and my own impressions: http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/tt/9fcec/#TL

Cheers,
Dennis

Many of us will see lake Ohrid in may this year

Ullswater in the Lake District, north west England.

I wandered lonely as a cloud, that floats on high over hills and dales, when all at once I saw a crows, a host of golden daffodils, beside the lake ........

My #1 vote, too goes to Ohrid, #2 to Balaton and Prespa.
I will see all three in the Summer... and many more VT-ers will see Ohrid and Prespa at the end of May.

By the way: since you are from Romania and never visited Macedonia so far... why not join the VT Euromeet in Belgrade + Bitola? Ohrid is in the program.

Did join now I have to be able to come to the meeting :)

for a larger lake, I like Lago di Viverone in the Piemonte region of Northern Italy. Beautfil views of the Alps.

http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/8c781/22423/

Hope this assists,

fergy.

Plitvice lakes (Croatia) are quite cute.

Of course the best lakes are in Finland :)
We have about 200,000 of them so you can have one of your own for the whole summer if you wish :)

There are lots of lakes in Trentino Alto Adige. It is the region where I live.

1) Alatsee in Bavaria, close to Füssen:
http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/tp/187bd7/
---
Holzöstersee near a place called Fûcking north of Salzburg:
http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/tp/18016f/
hotels are about 100 meters from the lake

Haha, I just looked at the map and it was totally uncalled for to mention that the lake is close to Fûcking :-)

In Sweden, we have thousands of lakes, but some of the most scenic are:

Lake Siljan (from a meteor collision). Here you could stay at famous Tällberg where there are several "health hotels" in traditional Dalecarlia architectural style and where the famous Tällberg Foundation on environmental matters with UN and others take place annually (so avoid that week). You could also visit Orsa Bear park with polar bears and other bears and where you walk "above" them and see a lot. Then there are loads of other typically Swedish sights in this region: http://www.siljan.se/en/

Lake Storsjön ("Big Lake") which is smack bang in the middle of Sweden and with Östersund as its biggest town (night trains from Stockholm for instance). Outside Östersund is the island of Frösön which starts off as a quiet Östersund suburb but gets more and more wild. See my Östersund page for the view from famous composer Peterson-Berger's home in summer. Never seen as many butterflies in my life as there in July! There is also a moose-farm in a village nearby and the lake is Sweden's Loch Ness with its own monster which people hope to see on tours with s/s Thomée.

Further south in Sweden, I would recommend Lake Åsnen (Växjö is the closest city here and Alvesta makes it reachable on the Stockholm-Malmö main line). Here you can see eagles and several other birds of prey, visit Huseby Bruk on the western side (see my page on Grimslöv I think) and the pretty area on the eastern side such as Jät with a historic old wooden church, Urshult with apple orchards etc. There is also ways to cycle around the lake.

Loads of Swedish lakes have canoe facilities and if that's what you like, I would suggest either Lake Immeln in the far south, or the Lake Båven area south of Stockholm. The latter has lots of interesting birds of prey and the Marsvikarna system connecting various lakes as you paddle through. Nice connections to Skavsta airport too:

http://www.ripsa.se/activities/exploring-lake-baven/

There are also some really dramatic lakes outside Gothenburg since there they have bedrock cliffs. You see it by train, approaching from Alingsås or Borås.

In other countries, Lake Luzern in Switzerland is one of my favourites, and I also like several of the ones in Lake District in England such as Ullswater (avoid Lake Windermere!). Scotland has some fantastic ones too - just not Loch Ness.

Yes, Siljan is lovely (with Mora and Rattvik on the shore).