Things to do
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Basilique de la Visitation d'Annecy
Completed in 1930 on the Crêt du Maure slope, holding the tombs of François de Sales and Jeanne de Chantal, who founded the Visitation order in this town in 1610. The interior is unusually restrained for its date. The terrace outside looks over the whole basin and is reached by a steep walk or a short drive.
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Cathédrale Saint-Pierre d'Annecy
Built as a chapel for a Franciscan convent in 1535 and pressed into service as a cathedral when Geneva turned Protestant and its bishop moved here. Rousseau sang in the choir and took music lessons in the house behind. The Renaissance front stands in a lane barely wide enough to step back in.
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Château d'Annecy
Seat of the counts of Geneva and then of a branch of the house of Savoy, abandoned after a fire and used as barracks until the town bought it in 1953. Its square keep holds regional collections and a lake observatory explaining the water below. The courtyard and the ramparts give the view down over the roofs.
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Château de Menthon-Saint-Bernard
Turrets on a bluff above the eastern shore, held by the same family for a thousand years and still lived in, which is why the visit takes in a library of twelve thousand books and rooms that are still furnished. Costumed tours run in summer. The silhouette is often said to have suggested Disney's castle.
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Gorges du Fier
A walkway bolted to the rock in 1869 runs for a quarter of a kilometre through a slot the river has cut to a depth of seventy metres, in places only a couple of metres wide. It is cool and loud and takes about forty minutes. Open spring to autumn, and ten minutes west of the town by car.
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Jardins de l'Europe
Planted in the 1860s on ground reclaimed from the lake, an arboretum of about six hundred and fifty trees including sequoias and a ginkgo, laid out around gravel walks between the quay and the canal. Swans work the shoreline. It joins the Pâquier, the wide open meadow where the town sits out in summer.
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Lac d'Annecy
Fourteen kilometres of glacial water between limestone ridges, among the cleanest lakes in Europe since the communes around it stopped discharging into it in 1957. Public beaches line the northern end and quieter ones sit at Talloires and Duingt. Boats run a circuit from the town quay and paddleboards are rented on the grass at Albigny.
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Le Semnoz
The ridge closing the lake basin on its western side, climbed by a road of hairpins that is a known test for cyclists and used by the Tour de France. Pasture at the top gives Mont Blanc on a clear day. There is a small ski area in winter and paragliders launch from the shoulder.
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Palais de l'Isle
A prow of stone splitting the Thiou canal, built in the twelfth century as a house, then used as a mint, a courthouse and a prison until 1865, with cells still fitted out. It is the most photographed building in Savoy. The small museum inside covers local architecture; the exterior is what most come for.
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Pont des Amours
An iron footbridge of 1907 over the Vassé canal, joining the public gardens to the Pâquier meadow, with the lake at one end and an avenue of trees at the other. Local superstition promises that a couple kissing on it stays together. It is small, and the reason to stand on it is the view south to the mountains.
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Roc de Chère
A wooded headland between Talloires and Menthon, protected as a national nature reserve because two geologies meet in it and Mediterranean and alpine plants grow within a few paces of each other. Marked paths cross it in an easy loop of about two hours, ending on a bluff directly above the water.