Plan your visit
Lac Pavin is one of France’s great natural sites — bring good shoes and a camera. Locate it on the map, book a room nearby in a click, or add it to your travel list to build your itinerary.
About Lac Pavin
Perfectly round and eerily deep, the Lac Pavin fills the crater of the youngest volcano in mainland France, born of a violent steam-driven eruption about 6,900 years ago in the Monts Dore of Auvergne. Ringed by steep beech forest and reflecting the sky in dark, still water, it has long inspired legends of a bottomless lake and a drowned village. A shaded footpath loops the crater rim in under an hour, offering glimpses of the deep blue water below and, from the neighbouring Puy de Montchal, sweeping views over the volcanic range. Scientifically famous for its stratified, gas-holding depths, Pavin is at once a geological curiosity and one of the most atmospheric walks in the Auvergne volcanoes.