Beyond Lago di Braies: five Dolomites lakes without a tour bus

At 9:30 on a morning in the first week of September, the car park at Lago di Braies held four coaches, and a queue of about thirty people stood at the rowing-boat dock. The lake was as green as the photographs say. The shoreline path, which on the page looks like a private walk, was moving at the speed of a school trip. I had been there at 7:10, and it had been close to empty. That two-hour difference is the whole story of this page.

For about ten years I planned destination weddings, and in the Dolomites the lake photograph always happened at 6:30am, because after ten there was no clear stretch of shore. I now write about honeymoons, and I send couples to Braies the same way: early, by the bus, once. Then I send them somewhere else. In the first week of September 2026 I spent six nights in the Dolomites with a rental car for the first two days and buses for the rest, and walked or visited the five lakes below. Our hut-to-hut guide covers the booking side of Braies and the rifugi; this one is about the water.

None of these lakes is secret, and I will not pretend otherwise. Misurina has a road and a hotel on its shore. Carezza gets coaches in the middle of the day. What separates them from Braies is that you can see each one properly at a time when no coach has arrived, and that each is easy to reach with a bus or a train and a pair of walking shoes. The Dolomites also sit across South Tyrol, Trentino and the Veneto. That is why the timetables, the passes and even the signs change as you cross a valley, and it is worth checking each bus operator's own page before you plan a day.

A word on fitness. One of the five is a proper walk, and the rest are flat or close to it. Nothing here needs a via ferrata set or technical gear. In September I wore trail shoes everywhere and a light waterproof jacket every day, because afternoon rain arrived four days out of six.

Sorapis is the one I would send a couple who actually like to walk. The path starts at the Passo Tre Croci, a few kilometers from Cortina d'Ampezzo, and runs through pines and then across rock to a bowl of water the color of a pale aquamarine. The color comes from fine rock flour that meltwater carries in, and it changes through the day with the light. There is a mountain hut on the shore, and in September I had a plate of pasta and coffee there at noon with perhaps a dozen other people.

I set out at 8am and reached the lake in a little under two and a half hours, with a short stop at the ladders. The cabled sections are brief and mostly an inconvenience in dry weather. In rain the rock is slick and I would not recommend them, and I would not take anyone in smooth soles or heels. Come down by a different time from the people climbing up, because the path is narrow in places and the descent at 11am meets the rush of the ascent.

Buses between Cortina and the pass run in summer; check the Cortina tourist office for the current timetable and the last bus back. Drivers should check parking and any access rules at the pass for the date of their visit, because they have been changing.

Carezza sits at about 1,500 meters in the Val d'Ega, under the pale towers of the Latemar. The lake is small, fenced and photographed to the point of cliché, and I can tell you the cliché is right on a still morning: the reflection of the Latemar is clear, the trees around it are very dark and the water goes from green to blue to violet as the sun moves. A local legend says a sorcerer painted the lake with a rainbow to win a water nymph, and the story is on a sign near the platform.

The path around it is short, with a viewing platform at one end. At 8am I shared it with a photographer and two couples. At 11:30 I walked back past a coach party of about forty, and I would not have stopped. It is at its best before nine, and it is a good fit as a first stop on a day that continues to a lift or a lunch.

By bus, the regional line from Bolzano goes via Nova Levante toward Passo Costalunga. If you sleep in the South Tyrol, ask your host whether the Südtirol Guest Pass is included, because it covers local public transport for guests of participating hotels. Asking that one question saved me more than any other tip on this page.

Misurina is the largest natural lake in the Cadore, and it is a good example of what happens when a beautiful place sits on a through road. The Tre Cime di Lavaredo are a toll road away, so the shore fills with buses and cars between 9am and 5pm. I went at 6:50am. The water was flat, the Sorapis group stood behind it and there was one man walking a dog. The path around the lake is flat and takes about an hour.

Lago d'Antorno is smaller and higher, a short walk from the road above Misurina, with pines on one side and rock on the other. In the evening, once the day traffic has gone down the valley, I sat on a log there for 40 minutes and was joined by two others. For a couple, this is the place I would suggest for a sunset drink from a flask, and I would carry it up, not hope to find a café open.

The honest caveat is that Misurina is a place where people come to see the Tre Cime, and in July and August it is busy from morning. September is better, and a weekday is better still.

Dobbiaco is on the railway, which is a rare thing in the Dolomites, and its lake sits a short walk or bike ride from the village. It is a calm, shallow lake in the trees with a flat path around it, and the water is clear enough to see the bottom in places. On a Wednesday morning I walked the loop in under an hour and passed perhaps ten people, most with a dog.

If you like music, there is a small piece of history here. Gustav Mahler spent several summers in the area in the early 1900s composing in a hut, and the village has marked the connection. I would not build a trip around it. It is a good detail for a rainy afternoon.

Dobbiaco works as a base because of the train. You can reach it from Bolzano or Innsbruck without a car, and you can catch the bus to Braies and a bus toward Cortina from here. Our hut-to-hut guide uses it as the night before a start. For a couple who want to spend three nights in one place without driving, it is the easiest answer in the whole range.

Alleghe is the least visited of the five and the one I would choose for a quiet third night. The lake is lower, at about 980 meters, and it was formed in 1771 when a landslide from the mountain above dammed the river. Behind the village stands the north-west face of the Civetta, more than 1,000 meters of rock rising directly from the valley. At 6:20pm in early September the face turned from grey to pink and then orange, a Dolomites effect the Italians call enrosadira, and the lakeside bench was empty except for me.

The village has restaurants and a lakeside path, and its ski lifts are shut in September, so it is calm. The bus ride from Belluno takes under two hours, and from Cortina over Passo Falzarego it takes about the same in summer; check the Dolomiti bus timetable the day before, because winter and summer services differ.

I paid for a lake-view room in a family hotel for two nights and slept with the window open. A double in the places I priced was lower than I paid in Cortina for the same week. Alleghe suits a couple who want to look at mountains, not climb them.

If you want one night in a mountain hut, make it at Sorapis or on the way to a pass, and book months ahead for July and August. A rifugio is not a hotel. Dinner is at a fixed time around 6:30 or 7pm, the doors close for the night around ten, and in many huts the bathroom is down the corridor. In return you wake at the lake before the first walker arrives. In the huts I paid, half board came to roughly €75–120 per person, which is in line with the rifugi covered in our hut guide.

For the rest of the trip, I would sleep in a hotel in a valley village and use buses. Alleghe, Dobbiaco and the villages near Cortina all have small family hotels. Ask for a room facing the mountains, not the road.

Summer buses connect most of what is above, but the services are thin and run on different schedules by province. Build the day backwards from the last bus, and write down both the departure time and the stop. On my second day I stood at Passo Tre Croci at 5:05pm and learned that the last bus down had left at 4:40.

Trains reach Dobbiaco from Bolzano and Fortezza, and from there you can reach Braies and Cortina by bus. For Carezza you need the regional bus from Bolzano. For Alleghe, use Belluno or Cortina. Our transport planning guide covers passes and the other options, and if you plan to walk anywhere above the valleys, check that your policy covers mountain rescue; our insurance pages explain what to look for. In an emergency, call 112.

Late June to early July is the quietest stretch for the high lakes, but snow can sit on the Sorapis path until late June. July and August are warm and busy, with thunderstorms most afternoons, so start early and be down by 2pm. The first half of September gave me the best balance: cool mornings, fewer people and most lifts and huts still open. By the end of the month many huts have closed.

The larches turn gold in the second half of October, and the lakes are beautiful then, but most huts and many lifts have shut and the buses run less often. If you go late, plan around hotels in the valleys and check each bus line.

Braies is still worth seeing, once, at dawn and by bus. After that, pick one of the five by the kind of day you want: a walk, a stop, an evening, a flat loop or a quiet room. For the wider area, see the Dolomites guide and our notes on Cortina d'Ampezzo.