The Hermannskarsee is a lake in

Tyrol Tyrol (; historically the Tyrole; de-AT, Tirol ; it, Tirolo) is a historical region in the Alps - in Northern Italy and western Austria. The area was historically the core of the County of Tyrol, part of the Holy Roman Empire, Austrian Emp ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

Location and access

The Hermannskarsee is located at a height of 2,216 m in the Hermannskar, a rocky

cirque A (; from the Latin word ') is an amphitheatre-like valley formed by glacial erosion. Alternative names for this landform are corrie (from Scottish Gaelic , meaning a pot or cauldron) and (; ). A cirque may also be a similarly shaped landform ...

, known locally as a ''kar'', in the

Hornbach chain The Hornbach chain (german: Hornbachkette) is a string of mountains, about 15 kilometres long, in the Allgäu Alps in the Austrian state of Tyrol (Bundesland), Tyrol. Geography The Hornbach chain branches at the Öfnerspitze from the main ...

. The ''kar'' and lake are surrounded by mountains: the

Großer Krottenkopf The Großer Krottenkopf is the highest mountain in the Allgäu Alps of Austria. It is Bundesamt für Eich- und Vermessungswesen Austria: Austrian Map online (Austrian 1:50,000 map series)''. and is part of a side branch of the Hornbach chain, w ...

mountain to the southwest, the Hornbachspitze to the west and the Faulewandspitzen to the north. The

Marchspitze The Marchspitze () is a prominent summit, made of main dolomite, in the Hornbach chain of the Allgäu Alps. It is located 1.5 kilometres east of the much better known Großer Krottenkopf and is entirely on Austrian soil. Ascent It is a ...

rises to the east. The lake lies entirely within Tyrol, about one kilometre southeast of its border with Bavaria. It may be reached on the Enzensperger Way, a mountain path which links the Kemptner Hut with the Hermann von Barth Hut. Lakes of Tyrol (federal state) Tarns of the Alps {{Tyrol-geo-stub