The Fanes-Sennes-Prags Nature Park covers 25,485 hectares and is the largest of the four Dolomite nature parks in South Tyrol. The Province of Bolzano set it up in 1980 and it is shared between six municipalities: Toblach (Dobbiaco), Prags (Braies), Olang (Valdaora), Abtei (Badia), Enneberg (Marebbe) and Wengen (La Valle). In Italian it is the Parco naturale Fanes-Senes-Braies.

Behind the ring of walls there is more than rock towers: there are wide plateaus, alpine pastures and lakes. The Fanes and Sennes plateaus and Plätzwiese are, the Province writes, the heart of the park, and they hold some of the most marked karst country in the Dolomites. Lake Braies and Lake Dobbiaco are inside its boundary.

Here you will find how the park is built, what you actually see, where to enter and where to leave the car. The rules that apply in every Dolomite park — dogs, drones, tents, bikes, mushrooms — are in our guide to the nature parks of the Dolomites.

A plateau that drinks its own water

The Province writes that nowhere else in the Dolomites is the landform as shaped by karst as at Fanes, Sennes and Fosses. Carbon dioxide dissolved in water has eaten into the Jurassic limestones and partly into the Main Dolomite, leaving limestone pavements, fissures, shafts, dolines, dry valleys and caves, among them the Conturines cave.

The result is that on the surface you barely see the water. When the level of the Piciodel lake is low a large funnel-shaped swallow hole appears: the stream disappears underground and comes back two kilometres further down, at Pederü. At Fodara Masaronn it emerges again from forty springs. Around the Green Lake water runs out of hundreds of fissures, with water mosses growing between the lowest falls.

The rocks of the plateaus are 225 to 190 million years old: Main Dolomite, then Dachstein limestone and grey Jurassic limestones, the pale beds that make up the summits of the Croda Rossa (Hohe Gaisl), the Croda del Beco (Seekofel), the Sasso della Croce (Heiligkreuzkofel), La Varela and Col Bechei. Where tilted beds have slid downhill, huge boulder fields remain — locally called stone cities — below the Sasso delle Dieci, the Sasso delle Nove, Cima La Stiga and the Croda del Beco.

What you see: lakes, alpine pastures, two plateaus

The two best-known lakes sit at the edge of the park. The walls of the Croda del Beco are reflected in Lake Braies; the southern shore of Lake Dobbiaco has wet meadows that the Province lists as an important habitat for many water birds. Higher up on the plateau the lakes are small: Lake Limo, the Green Lake, the Piciodel lake. Around Lake Limo the Rosso Ammonitico crops out, limestone full of spiral fossils.

The Fanes plateau, with its alpine farms and huts, is the busiest part of the park: you reach it from Pederü on the route to Rifugio Lavarella. Plätzwiese (Prato Piazza), at about 2,000 metres, is the other balcony: wide meadows with the Croda Rossa straight ahead.

One detail for people who read rocks: the youngest marine sediments in the whole Dolomites are at Col Bechei, 2,794 metres, above Lake Limo. They are the record of one last, short marine invasion while the Alps were already rising.

The wildlife, and at what height you find it

The symbol of the park is the marmot, common on the pastures of Fanes and Sennes and around Plätzwiese. You can see them from the trail, the Province writes, but only if you stand still and keep quiet: otherwise the sentry whistles and the whole group vanishes into the burrows. That alarm whistle is aimed above all at the golden eagle, its main enemy.

The plateaus and the Prags Dolomites are good ground for chamois, which in summer graze in groups of females and young. In the woods live roe deer and red deer, back since the early twentieth century after disappearing; at dusk fox, badger, beech marten and pine marten move about. Among forest birds there are capercaillie and hazel grouse, and black grouse at the tree line.

  • Up to about 2,000 metres: dense spruce forest, with larch and, higher up, Swiss stone pine
  • Between 2,000 and 2,800 metres: limestone grassland of blue moor grass and sedge, with edelweiss, Rhaetian poppy and Thlaspi on the screes
  • Above 3,000 metres: bare rock, with plants rooted in the fissures

Where to enter and where to leave the car

You can enter the park from four sides, and each has its own valley-floor car park.

The most direct gate is Val de Mareo, behind San Vigilio di Marebbe: the Province calls it one of the most important approaches to the heart of the park. The road ends at Pederü, and from there you walk up to the plateaus. At San Vigilio, at the mouth of the valley, is the visitor centre, with free parking.

From the Puster Valley you enter through the Prags valley towards the lake, and at Brückele (Ponticello), where the toll road to Plätzwiese starts. From Toblach you enter instead through the Val di Landro, and at Cimabanche trail 18 climbs to Plätzwiese. From Alta Badia you start at Capanna Alpina above Armentarola and from the Armentara meadows above La Val.

Access rules, valley by valley

In this park the roads are regulated differently from one valley to the next, and the rules change with the season. Right now, in October, the Prags valley tourist board writes that there are no traffic restrictions in the valley apart from the Plätzwiese toll road, and that nothing needs to be booked.

Summer is another matter. In 2026, from 1 July to 15 September and between 9 am and 4 pm, you could only enter the Prags valley by public transport, on foot, by bike or with a booking: the combined ticket cost 44 euros and gave 22 back as a voucher. The tourist board says a road regulation will be in force again in summer 2027, with details in the spring. The comparison with the other lakes is in our guide to lake parking.

At Plätzwiese the road from Brückele is a toll road for its whole open season and parking spaces are few: 3 Zinnen Dolomites writes that you may generally drive up before 10 am and after 3 pm, and that access is closed once the car park is full. In summer there is the line 443 bus from Toblach, Niederdorf and Welsberg; in winter a shuttle from Brückele. On foot from Brückele it takes about two and a half hours.

How the park came about, and what it stopped

The protection decree dates from 1980. The Province recounts that Plätzwiese was close to becoming a second Seiser Alm: a ski-lift circuit, tennis courts, a holiday village and large car parks had already been planned, and the creation of the park saved it at the last moment. Of the park's municipalities, Wengen (La Valle) has kept its rural character best and is the only one with no ski lifts.

Since the summer of 2009 the park has been part of the Dolomites UNESCO World Heritage Site, in the Northern Dolomites system, and it is also a Natura 2000 area. The visitor centre in San Vigilio di Marebbe tells the story of how the Dolomites formed, of the Conturines bear and of the park's habitats, with a three-dimensional relief model of the area: in 2026 it is open until 31 October, Tuesday to Saturday, 9.30 am to 12.30 pm and 2.30 pm to 6 pm, free of charge.

Inside the park

Our pages that fall within the park’s mountain groups.

Hikes

To see

I prati panoramici dell'altopiano del Pralongià in Alta Badia

Sight · Alta Badia

Altopiano del Pralongià

The panoramic plateau of Alta Badia between Corvara and San Cassiano: a rolling sea of meadows with the Sella group, the Sassongher and the Marmolada always in view.

Lago di Limo on the Fanes plateau, between limestone slopes and mountain pines

Sight · San Vigilio di Marebbe e Fanes

Altopiano e laghi di Fanes

A high-altitude plateau dotted with small lakes and pastures, at the heart of the Ladin legends of the Kingdom of Fanes.

The Armentara meadows with wooden hay barns and the snow-dusted Sasso di Santa Croce behind

Sight · Alta Badia

Borgo di La Val e prati di Armentara

The rural village of La Val and the well-known Armentara meadows: a sea of wildflowers at the foot of Sasso di Santa Croce, one of the most genuine corners of Alta Badia.

The Fanes Waterfalls in the wooded gorge of Val di Fanes, on the Cortina d'Ampezzo side

Sight · Cortina d'Ampezzo

Cascate di Fanes

Spectacular waterfalls tucked in a shaded forest gorge just north of Cortina, in the Ampezzo Dolomites Nature Park.

Wooden rowing boats moored in front of the boathouse on Lago di Braies, with the Croda del Becco

Sight · Val Pusteria e Lago di Braies

Lago di Braies e le barche di legno

Lago di Braies, Pragser Wildsee in German, is an alpine lake at 1,496 metres in the Val Pusteria, famous for its emerald-green water, the historic boathouse and the wooden rowing boats at the foot of Croda del Becco. In summer access to the valley is regulated: book online or arrive early.

Lake Dobbiaco with the woods and peaks of the Alta Pusteria behind it

Sight · Val di Sesto (Alta Pusteria)

Lago di Dobbiaco

Lake Dobbiaco (Toblacher See) is a landslide-dammed lake at 1,251 metres, on the road that drops from Dobbiaco towards Landro and Cortina. A flat path loops around it in a little over an hour, rowing boats and pedalos run in summer, and in winter the basin turns into one of the cross-country skiing hubs of the Dolomites.

Huts

Rifugio Lavarella on the Fanes alp meadows, with its terrace and the pale peaks of the plateau behind2,050 m

Mountain hut · San Vigilio di Marebbe e Fanes

Rifugio Lavarella

overnight stays

Frequently asked questions

How big is the Fanes-Sennes-Prags Nature Park?
25,485 hectares, according to the Province of Bolzano fact sheet: it is the largest of the four Dolomite nature parks in South Tyrol. It is shared between the municipalities of Toblach, Prags, Olang, Abtei, Enneberg and Wengen, and the difference between its lowest and highest point is 1,929 metres.
When was the Fanes-Sennes-Prags park established?
In 1980, by a landscape protection decree of the Autonomous Province of Bolzano. It is the third of the four South Tyrolean Dolomite parks by date, after Schlern-Rosengarten (1974) and Puez-Geisler (1978), and before Drei Zinnen (1981).
How do you get to Plätzwiese (Prato Piazza)?
By the toll road that starts at Brückele, in the Prags valley. Parking spaces are limited and you may generally drive up before 10 am and after 3 pm; once the car park is full, access is closed. In summer there is the line 443 bus from Toblach, Niederdorf and Welsberg, in winter a shuttle from Brückele. On foot from Brückele it takes about two and a half hours.
Do you need a booking to enter the Prags valley?
It depends on the season. In autumn, no: the valley tourist board writes that there are no traffic restrictions apart from the Plätzwiese toll road. In summer 2026, however, from 1 July to 15 September between 9 am and 4 pm, you could only enter by public transport, on foot, by bike or with a booking, and the combined ticket cost 44 euros with a 22-euro voucher. The regulation returns in summer 2027.
Where do you leave the car for the Fanes plateau?
At Pederü, at the end of Val de Mareo behind San Vigilio di Marebbe: from there you walk up to the plateau, where the Fanes and Lavarella huts stand. The Province names Val de Mareo as one of the most important approaches to the heart of the park.
Where is the visitor centre and when is it open?
In San Vigilio di Marebbe, at Via Katharina Lanz 96, with free parking in front. In 2026 it is open until 31 October, Tuesday to Saturday, 9.30 am to 12.30 pm and 2.30 pm to 6 pm, last entry 5.30 pm, free of charge; it closes on official public holidays except 15 August.
Is the Fanes-Sennes-Prags park a UNESCO World Heritage Site?
Yes. Since the summer of 2009 it has been part of the Dolomites UNESCO World Heritage Site, in the Northern Dolomites system, and it is also a Natura 2000 area. World Heritage and park do not coincide, though: they have different boundaries and different laws.

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