8 Easy Walks in the Dolomites, From Braies to Alpe di Siusi

The Dolomites look like climbers' country, yet many of their best views sit beside a lake or on a high meadow. With a bus or a lift to the start, first-time walkers can see the famous places in 1 to 2 hours.

On this page an easy walk is one of the shorter walks in the Dolomites: a marked path of 20 minutes to half a day with little climbing. Five are stages of our walking tours, and three are lakes within reach of our bases. For trips built around walks like these, see the Dolomites walking guide.

The Best Easy Walks in the Dolomites

The table compares the eight walks on distance, time and climb, from the park and tourist board figures for 2026.

The first five are days on our tours, so their figures come from the day itself. The last three are lake loops near our bases for an arrival day, a rest day or a wet morning.

Each entry gives the start, the tour day and who the walk suits. Where a famous walk is easy only in its first hour, it says where to turn round.

1. Lago di Braies Lakeside Loop

• Distance: 3.6 km loop

• Time: About 1 hour

• Climb: 39 m, between 1,492 and 1,531 m

• Start: Lago di Braies inn, signed "Seeweg"

• On our tours: Alta Pusteria day 4, Dolomites Inn-to-Inn day 2

• Best for: Families, first days

Braies is the classic Dolomites lake, green water under the 2,810 m Croda del Becco. The loop is free and signed from the inn. The Val Pusteria tourist board times it at one hour.

The two shores differ. From the inn, the left-hand side passes the boat hire, then narrows over roots and climbs a short path along a rock wall. The far end has small beaches with toilets, and the wide western shore is the easy half for a pushchair.

The water is too cold for swimming, and the park asks visitors to stay out. On our tours the loop is only the first hour of a longer, steeper day.

On Alta Pusteria Walking Holidays, day 4 carries on past the lake to the Alte Kaser pastures and Hochalm, 17 km with 1,030 m of climb. The Dolomites inn-to-inn tour takes a 40-minute bus from Dobbiaco and climbs from the shore to Rossalm on day 2, 14 km in all.

Either way, the loop is easy and the day is not, so walkers who only want the lake can stop at the shore and take the bus back. Alta Pusteria starts and ends in Dobbiaco, with Braies on day 4 and the Tre Cime on day 7. The inn-to-inn moves on after Braies, sleeping two nights at Prato Piazza and two in Cortina.

2. Tre Cime: Rifugio Auronzo to Rifugio Lavaredo

• Distance: Rifugio Auronzo to Rifugio Lavaredo on path 101

• Time: 20 minutes each way; about 2 hours to Rifugio Locatelli

• Climb: Almost none to Lavaredo

• Start: Rifugio Auronzo, end of the bus and toll road

• On our tours: Alta Pusteria day 7, Inn-to-Inn day 6, Cortina Iconic Hikes day 4

• Best for: Seeing the Tre Cime without the full circuit

You can see the Tre Cime close up without a long walk. The track from Rifugio Auronzo to Rifugio Lavaredo is wide, and the hut itself calls the 20-minute path completely flat. Rifugio Lavaredo sits at 2,344 m, right under the south walls.

Above the hut a short, steep climb leads to Forcella Lavaredo, the saddle where the north faces come into view. That climb is the turning point for families; beyond it the path to Rifugio Locatelli takes about two hours from Auronzo.

Our tours walk the whole circuit. Alta Pusteria day 7 is 8.5 km with 400 m of climb, and the inn-to-inn's day 6 is 10 km with 450 m. Cortina d'Ampezzo Iconic Hikes walks 10 km by Rifugio Locatelli on day 4. Longer routes from here are in our sister site's Dolomites hiking guide.

3. Alpe di Siusi From Compatsch

• Distance: 11.5 km circuit, or 10 km Compatsch to Saltria

• Time: Half a day

• Climb: 340 m on the circuit

• Start: Compatsch, top of the gondola from Seis

• On our tours: Alpe di Siusi Inn-to-Inn days 4 and 5, Seiser Alm Highlights day 2

• Best for: Older walkers, slow days

The plateau is the gentlest ground in the Dolomites. The Seiser Alm gondola lifts walkers, prams and dogs from Seis in 15 minutes. At the top is what the resort calls Europe's largest high alpine pasture, with wide paths between huts.

The Alpe di Siusi inn-to-inn tour is our easiest trip, graded 2 of 5. Day 4 loops round Piz Ridl, 11.5 km with 340 m of climb, and day 5 drifts past small lakes to Saltria. Our Alpe di Siusi walks guide covers every route on the plateau.

4. Colbricon Lakes From Passo Rolle

• Distance: Malga Rolle to the lakes on path 348

• Time: 40 – 60 minutes each way

• Climb: Moderate, with short ups and downs

• Start: Malga Rolle, about 1 km north of Passo Rolle

• On our tours: Pale di San Martino Highlights day 2

• Best for: A quiet lake away from the crowds

Two small glacial lakes sit at about 1,909 and 1,922 m on the edge of the Lagorai range. Path 348 crosses a larch and fir wood with moderate gradients and only short ups and downs. The bus from San Martino di Castrozza to the pass takes about 15 minutes.

On Pale di San Martino Highlights the lakes end day 2. The tour first loops over Monte Cavallazza, 2,324 m, past First World War trenches, then drops to the water. The whole day is 7 km with 450 m of climb; the lakes alone are the easy part.

5. Cinque Torri Open-Air Museum

• Distance: Four marked museum paths

• Time: 20 minutes to 2 hours

• Climb: Little on the trench paths

• Start: Rifugio Scoiattoli, top of the Cinque Torri chairlift

• On our tours: Cortina Iconic Hikes day 3

• Best for: History and big rock towers

Five minutes from the chairlift, trenches dug between 1915 and 1917 run round the towers. The Cinque Torri museum marks four paths: the upper trench takes about 20 minutes, the trench path 30, and the round of the towers about two hours.

Cortina Iconic Hikes starts its day 3 at Passo Falzarego and walks 15 km, ending with a 1,300 m descent. The easy version is lift up, trenches, lift down, which leaves the long descent to those who want it.

6. Lago di Dobbiaco Nature Trail

• Distance: 2.6 km loop, or 7.9 km from Dobbiaco village

• Time: 40 minutes, or 2 hours 30 from the village

• Climb: 10 m on the loop

• Start: Lake car park, signed "Naturlehrpfad"

• On our tours: Dobbiaco is the first and last night of two tours

• Best for: Arrival and departure days

Alta Pusteria and the inn-to-inn both begin and end in Dobbiaco, and its lake suits the afternoon you arrive. The nature trail circles the water in 40 minutes and gains 10 m.

Walk from the village instead and it becomes 7.9 km and two and a half hours, still with only 61 m of climb. The tourist board lists it as a family walk, and it is the flattest walk on this page.

7. Lago di Misurina Loop

• Distance: About 2.6 km loop

• Time: 30 – 40 minutes

• Climb: Flat

• Start: Misurina, by the bus stop

• On our tours: On the way to the Tre Cime from Cortina

• Best for: Pairing with the Tre Cime

The Dolomiti Bus shuttle to Rifugio Auronzo leaves from Misurina Genzianella, so a lap of the lake fits before or after the Tre Cime on our Cortina days.

The path follows the shore on the flat for about 2.6 km, with the village and its hotels at one end. It is the easiest way to add a second lake to a Tre Cime day.

8. Lago di Carezza

• Distance: Short loop about 1.3 km; long loop 3.8 km

• Time: 20 – 30 minutes; long loop about 1 hour

• Climb: Little; 98 m on the long loop

• Start: Car park, through the underpass to the viewing platform

• On our tours: None; a day out from the Alpe di Siusi tours

• Best for: A short stop on a bus day

You can't walk down to the water at Carezza. The lake is a fenced natural monument, and the Eggental tourist board asks visitors not to cross the fences or swim. The loop runs above the shore, clockwise from a viewing platform.

The lake is 300 m long and 140 m wide, fed by springs under the Latemar, so its size changes with the season. The long loop adds forest, 3.8 km with 98 m of climb. Bus 180 runs from Bolzano.

Easy Walks for Families and Pushchairs

Most of these walks suit children who can walk for an hour. Our tours take children from 8 who are fit and sure-footed, and the Alpe di Siusi week is the gentlest for a family.

With a pushchair, choose your side and your lift. The western shore at Braies is wide gravel, while the other shore has roots and a rock-wall climb. Dobbiaco and Misurina are flat all the way round, and the Seiser Alm gondola carries prams up to the plateau.

The Tre Cime needs more care. The 20 minutes to Rifugio Lavaredo are flat, but the climb to Forcella Lavaredo is steep and rocky, and a carrier works better than wheels there. At Braies, toilets are at the southern beaches and near car park P4.

Famous Walks That Are Harder Than They Look

Several walks sold as easy are full days. The Tre Cime circuit is the clearest case: the official Tre Cime site gives four to five hours for paths 101 and 105, and our tours count 400 to 450 m of climb.

Lago di Sorapis is the second. Cortina Iconic Hikes walks it on day 5, 12 km with 440 m of climb from Passo Tre Croci, about two hours each way on path 215.

Path 215 has metal ladders and a cabled ledge with drops beside it, which unsettles people who expected a lake stroll. Monte Faloria above Cortina is the third: a gondola up, then 1,000 m of descent on day 5 of the inn-to-inn and day 2 of Cortina Iconic Hikes.

Long descents are hard on knees. For hikes on this scale and longer, up to the Alta Via routes, see the Dolomites hiking guide on our sister site.

Getting There Without a Car

Buses or lifts reach most of the starts, but Braies and bus 444 to the Tre Cime need a seat booked in advance in summer. The table lists the line and booking rule for each, from the 2026 timetables of the lake and transport operators.

Braies has the strictest rule. From 1 July to 15 September, cars may enter the valley between 9:00 and 16:00 only with an online booking, and the Braies valley site sells it with a parking space. Arriving before 9:00 is allowed, but no space is promised.

The Tre Cime toll road from Misurina takes cars only with an online booking that carries your number plate, from the end of May to the end of October.

From Cortina, the Dolomiti Bus line 51 reaches Misurina in the main summer weeks, until 9 September. On Alpe di Siusi the road from Seis is closed to cars from 9:00 to 17:00, so the gondola is the way up. For flights and trains, see how to get to the Dolomites.

How Much It Costs

The walks are free, and so is Lago di Braies itself. What costs money is getting a car or a seat to the start, and the Braies permit is needed only from 1 July to 15 September. The Braies combined ticket is 44 EUR, covering the valley permit, a guaranteed space and a 22 EUR voucher for the lake's restaurants and shops.

The Tre Cime toll road is 40 EUR a car and 26 EUR a motorbike. Bus 444 starts at 16 EUR, children under 6 free, while the Dolomiti Bus shuttle from Misurina is a 10 EUR day ticket. Parking at Compatsch costs 30 EUR a day, the same as a return gondola ride.

What to Pack

The lake loops need little more than walking shoes, water and a light jacket. The Tre Cime walk starts at over 2,200 m, where the air stays cool even in summer, so bring a warm layer and a waterproof, and sturdy shoes beat trainers on rock.

Carry cash for huts and for the boat hire at Braies, sun cream for the open plateau at Alpe di Siusi, and poles only for the harder walks. Our tour pages list the full kit.

Ready to Walk the Dolomites?

On our tours, the easy walks on this page are the first or last hour of a day. Pick Alpe di Siusi for the gentlest week, or Alta Pusteria for Braies and the Tre Cime. Send an inquiry with your dates and how far you like to walk.