On the Shores of Lake Annecy: A Virtual Postcard

Ice cream in hand, postcards in bag, I’m lounging on the lawn that divides the old town from the lake. Behind me lie a canal, a château, a maze of roughcast buildings. On the lake, swans drift past pedal boats. The birds are relaxed and lazy under a bright July sky.

I’m exquisitely happy to be here.

Roughcast buildings beside the Thiou River running through Annecy, France. Photo by Whitney Brown.

Annecy — the small town I’m visiting in the French Alps—is a slice of heaven, a beautiful spot for nature lovers and artists. Its namesake lake lies at the foot of towering mountains, and the green river that flows through town is lined with clementine- and mint-colored buildings. Petunias bloom from each and every pedestrian bridge, or at least all of the pedestrian bridges that I’ve seen, and a stone building shaped like a ship rises from a tiny island in the canal. On the highest point in the old town, a 13th-century castle keeps watch over both the Annéciens and the city’s admirers, the ones who are visiting from elsewhere. The ones like me.

Wedged between the hill and the canal are restaurants, souvenir shops, and gelaterias. Many of the businesses are tucked behind stone arcades — cool, inviting caverns in the summer warmth. Minutes ago, one of them lured me inside, then sent me back into the street with a scoop of stracciatella gelato.

A gelateria in Annecy’s Vieille Ville, or old town. Photo by Whitney Brown.

As I returned to the walkway beside the canal, the mountains looked like a hazy periwinkle mass, and the lake was hidden behind bridges and buildings. But with each step I took toward the lakefront, the image sharpened. The mountains’ bands of limestone became craggier. The trees came into focus. Finally, the shimmering water appeared.

The French Alps behind the canal that bisects Annecy’s old town. Photo by Whitney Brown.

I crossed the park next to the lake, stopping only to chat with a local artist selling reprints from a small cart. From her offerings, I selected two postcards, gingerly tucking them into my crowded bag.

Now, on the grass, I begin to examine them. One features a wooden dock near Annecy’s now-familiar mountains, and the other shows a boat bobbing on turquoise water. The postcards provide another reminder that this is no ordinary place, and they suggest to me that if Lake Annecy is worth painting, it’s also worth protecting. Luckily, thanks to high environmental standards that date back to the 1950s, it’s one of the cleanest lakes in Europe. And as I watch the sunlight sparkling on the water, I silently thank the locals who kept (and keep) this lake pristine.

A water-skier behind a boat on Lake Annecy. Photo by Whitney Brown.

It’s not the first time this weekend that I’ve felt grateful for Lake Annecy. Yesterday I rode a boat across the water, where the captain navigated between kayakers and water-skiers. Paragliders hung above us in the pastel sky, and sailboats darted from shore to shore.

When I disembarked, I found an equipment rental store, then paddleboarded around the lake for a couple of hours. As I crossed the water, I spotted French children learning to sail, saw large boats chugging toward lakeside villages. I kept my balance when I entered the wake of passing bâteaux, dangled my feet off the paddleboard when I was alone on quiet water. I returned to Annecy via shining waves, the concentration of swans and swimmers increasing as I approached the town’s tiny beaches.

Two people on paddleboards, a swan, and several small boats on Lake Annecy. Photo by Whitney Brown.

All of us, birds and humans, and probably the fish below the surface too, were united by our love for the lake. I could sense it in the swans’ breezy movements, could see it in the grins on other people’s faces.

By the end of the afternoon, my arms were sore, but my spirits were high. Lake Annecy is thousands of years old, the product of long-gone glaciers, and I am 23 years old, the product of an American upbringing. But my afternoon adventure was an exhilarating culmination of those histories. At least for me.

So as I sit on the shore now, I hold my postcards up to the lake, thinking of the people who have already painted these waters — Paul Cézanne, the local artist who just sold me her reprints. Slowly, I pull out my watercolor supplies: paper, paints, brushes, water bottle, paper cup. They were the just-in-case items that I placed in my bag before I left Paris, and although I’m not much of an artist, I’m going to spend my afternoon putting Lake Annecy on paper.

The author’s watercolor held up in front of Lake Annecy, France. Photo by Whitney Brown.

I’ve learned that you don’t need to be a swan or a champion water-skier to appreciate the lake. And I’m hoping that you don’t need to be a professional painter to capture Annecy’s beauty. I’m going to commemorate my perfect days in Annecy in my own imperfect way. When the weekend is over, and it almost is, I’m going to take home a souvenir of my own making.

Creating art is all that I can do to thank Annecy, and I want Annecy to know that I won’t forget her.