There is no difficulty in finding a beautiful lake in Austria, luckily there are dozens of them all over the country. However, the body of water that opens up before your eyes in Styria cannot be seen every day. Enchanted by the surrounding mountains, the green lake is beautiful, incredible, a true kaleidoscope of colors.
The water shines with green and turquoise, with iridescent and intense colors that change at any moment. You immediately notice that this is not a place like any other, it is a magical place: Green Lake. Since you plan a trip to Green Lake. We know that it will not be an experience equal to the others; starting from the color of the water it looks different depending on the time of year. Every year with the arrival of the beautiful season, specifically spring,
near the village of Tragoess in the heart of Styria, a real miracle takes place, in fact with the melting of the ice we have the formation of the Gruner See, the great lake green that in winter … does not exist!
In spring, the lake begins to slowly fill up with water that slowly melts from the glaciers of the Hochschwab group, a mountain massif in the North-Eastern Alps of Styria in the Northern Styrian Alps. It reaches its peak of about ten meters, if you look around you will find that on the surrounding mountains there will be no more snow or almost. This situation will remain so until the summer when the water level will slowly begin to decrease rapidly.
Every year, with the spring, the snow, and the ice melted in the sun, they reach the bottom of this green valley, submerging everything they encounter. From this gentle flood the Gruner See is born, a wonder of water that gives brave divers and swimmers the opportunity to swim among meadows, benches, trees, leaves, and paths. It seems incredible but you will have a clear view up to 40 meters: all thanks to the pure snow!
In May and June, the lake has its maximum water depth before the water begins to disappear again. So, if you arrive in late summer or autumn, you won’t find a lake. Every year the park, “victim of these spring floods”, is a destination for tourists from all over the world, especially for diving enthusiasts who will find waters here with temperatures between 4 and 8 degrees (not really the temperature for a regenerating swim, but with a wetsuit, you will avoid getting hit !!): among the crystal clear waters it will be possible to find field daisies instead of corals, gravel paths instead of rocks, no algae but only branches, leaves, and robust trunks.
So hurry up:
with the arrival of autumn, the Gruner See will shrink to little more than a puddle only to be surrounded by snow as soon as winter breaks through. And then the paths, the benches (hopefully, dry), the dead branches, the bridges, and the paths will return. But don’t worry: after the long Austrian winter, magic will return in the new year, as always, in spring. The day is fantastic if you think that the experience of the lake is not enough you can incorporate into your trip even a hike in Graz. The city is about an hour away from the green lake.