Lake Abant

Abant was formed when a landslide dammed a valley in the Abant mountains, leaving a lake of about 127 hectares and up to 18 metres deep, fed by groundwater, sitting at about 1,330 metres in a bowl of fir, beech and pine some 34 kilometres south-west of Bolu. Protected as a nature park from 1988, it became Turkey's 48th national park on 10 June 2022. A track runs the whole way round it - roughly seven kilometres, flat, and the standard thing to do here - walked, cycled, ridden on horseback or taken in one of the horse-drawn phaetons that wait at the entrance. The water is cold and fishing is managed; trout is what the restaurants around the lake serve. It is a nature park rather than a wild place: there are hotels at one end, cafés, and a good deal of weekend traffic from Istanbul and Ankara, both about three hours away. Autumn is when it looks best, with the beech turning around the water, and it holds snow through winter, when the lake sometimes freezes at the edges and the road up needs care.

The landscape

• The shore circuit - the seven-kilometre track round the lake.
• The fir and beech - forest running down to the water.
• The phaetons - horse-drawn carts working the loop.
• The autumn colour - the beech turning in October.

When to go

May to October for walking; late October for colour; December to February for snow. Weekdays are calm - weekends bring heavy traffic from both big cities.

Good to know

It is a managed park with entrance fees, hotels and crowds, not wilderness. Weekend congestion on the access road is real. The lake is too cold for swimming and bathing is not the point.

Nearby

Yedigöller is north over the mountains; Mudurnu and Göynük are south-west.

Key facts