Lac du Bourget (; English Lake Bourget), also locally known as Lac Gris (; en, Grey Lake) or Lac d'Aix (), is a

lake A lake is an area filled with water, localized in a basin, surrounded by land, and distinct from any river or other outlet that serves to feed or drain the lake. Lakes lie on land and are not part of the ocean, although, like the much large ...

at the southernmost end of the Jura Mountains in the department of

Savoie Savoie (; Arpitan: ''Savouè'' or ''Savouè-d'Avâl''; English: ''Savoy'' ) is a department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, Southeastern France. Located in the French Alps, its prefecture is Chambéry. In 2019, Savoie had a population ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

. It is the deepest lake located entirely within France, and either the largest or second largest after

Lac de Grand-Lieu Lac de Grand-Lieu () is a lake located to the southwest of Nantes, in the Loire-Atlantique, France, and almost entirely in Saint-Philbert-de-Grand-Lieu. At an elevation of , its surface area is , making it the largest lake in France in winter, bu ...

depending on season. The largest town on its shore is

Aix-les-Bains Aix-les-Bains (, ; frp, Èx-los-Bens; la, Aquae Gratianae), locally simply Aix, is a commune in the southeastern French department of Savoie.

Chambéry Chambéry (, , ; Arpitan: ''Chambèri'') is the prefecture of the Savoie department in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region of eastern France. The population of the commune of Chambéry was 58,917 as of 2019, while the population of the Chamb ...

, the capital of Savoie, lies about 10 km south of the lake. The lake is mainly fed by the river

Leysse The Leysse is the river which crosses the city of Chambéry, Savoie, France. At its entrance into the city, it goes underground in a channel of about one kilometer. Characteristics It comes from the mountains east of Chambéry, and continues ...

(and other small rivers), and it drains towards the river

Rhône The Rhône ( , ; wae, Rotten ; frp, Rôno ; oc, Ròse ) is a major river in France and Switzerland, rising in the Alps and flowing west and south through Lake Geneva and southeastern France before discharging into the Mediterranean Sea. At Ar ...

through the

Canal de Savières The Canal de Savières () is a canal in eastern France. It joins the Lac du Bourget to the Rhône at Chanaz. It is long with one lock.Ramsar site. The extinct bezoule was found only in this lake. The lake was formed during the last period of global glaciation in the Alps (Würm glaciation) during the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was finally confirmed in ...

epoch. It has a surface area of . The long and narrow north-south axis of the lake extends 18 km in length, and ranges between 1.6 km and 3.5 km in width. The lake's average depth is 85 m, and its maximum depth in 145 m. The lake is

meromictic A meromictic lake is a lake which has layers of water that do not intermix. In ordinary, holomictic lakes, at least once each year, there is a physical mixing of the surface and the deep waters. The term ''meromictic'' was coined by the Austr ...

. Unlike ordinary lakes, its deep water does not mix annually with water closer to the surface. The lake is bordered by the steep summits of the Mont du Chat and the

Chaîne de l'Épine The Chaîne de l'Épine, in the department of Savoie in southeast France, is a long ridge of the Jura Mountains that runs north–south along the east side of the Lac d'Aiguebelette, from the Col de l'Épine west of Chambéry as far as th ...

on the west, and Bauges Mountains on the east, which form its shores. Lac du Bourget was made famous by several romantic poems of

Alphonse de Lamartine Alphonse Marie Louis de Prat de Lamartine (; 21 October 179028 February 1869), was a French author, poet, and statesman who was instrumental in the foundation of the Second Republic and the continuation of the Tricolore as the flag of France. ...

, including ''Le Lac'', as well as by descriptions by

Xavier de Maistre Xavier de Maistre (; 10 October 1763 – 12 June 1852) of Savoy (then part of the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia) lived largely as a military man but is known as a French writer. The younger brother of Joseph de Maistre, a noted philosopher a ...

Honoré de Balzac Honoré de Balzac ( , more commonly , ; born Honoré Balzac;Jean-Louis Dega, La vie prodigieuse de Bernard-François Balssa, père d'Honoré de Balzac : Aux sources historiques de La Comédie humaine, Rodez, Subervie, 1998, 665 p. 20 May 179 ...

, and Alexandre Dumas. Bourget lac panoramic-3 2007-08-17

Origin of the name

Named Lacus de Burgeto in 1313, its name "Le Bourget" comes from the eponymous castle, which became the main residence of the

Counts of Savoy The titles of count, then of duke of Savoy are titles of nobility attached to the historical territory of Savoy. Since its creation, in the 11th century, the county was held by the House of Savoy. The County of Savoy was elevated to a duchy at ...

from the middle of the 13th century until the following century. Formerly, it was called "Lac de Châtillon" (Ripa laci de Castellione in the 13th century), in reference to the castle and the eponymous seigneury. It is mentioned in particular in the donation made by the Count of Savoy Amédée III in 1125, for the foundation of the abbey of Hautecombe, "on the shore of the lake of Châtillon" (supra ripam loci de Castellione).

Climate

Lake Bourget features an oceanic climate (

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (born 1951), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author and ...

: ''Cfb''), like most places in

Western Europe Western Europe is the western region of Europe. The region's countries and territories vary depending on context. The concept of "the West" appeared in Europe in juxtaposition to "the East" and originally applied to the ancient Mediterranean ...

. In spite of this, it is highly influenced by its interior position within France near several mountain ranges, resulting in quite hot summers and cool to cold winters with frequent temperatures below freezing, especially at night. The surrounding mountains such as mont du Chat or

mont Revard Mont Revard (, ) is a mountain in the Bauges Massif near Aix-les-Bains in Savoie, France. The mountain is crossed by the D913 road between the villages of Saint-Jean-d'Arvey and Pugny-Chatenod near Aix-les-Bains. The ski resort of Le Revard i ...

have a

warm-summer humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freezing ...

(

: ''Dfb'').

Convective Convection is single or multiphase fluid flow that occurs spontaneously due to the combined effects of material property heterogeneity and body forces on a fluid, most commonly density and gravity (see buoyancy). When the cause of the convec ...

rainfall is frequent for much of the year, rendering high precipitation/day quotas. The nearest weather station is located at Chambéry Airport, less than a mile south of the lake.

References

External links

Lake of Bourget photos Tip2trip.com

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lac Du Bourget Bourget Bourget Ramsar sites in Metropolitan France Aix-les-Bains