Lago di Maen (Lago di Ussin)

Halfway up the Valtournenche valley, where the road to Cervinia is still climbing, a broad sheet of water sits directly beside it. Lago di Maen, also called Lago di Ussin, is an artificial basin at 1,311 metres whose engineered basin sits within a landscape of open shore and alpine peaks.

Why it matters

The LoveVdA regional portal lists the lake among the valley's lakes and waterfalls, describing an artificial basin in the middle of the valley at 1,311 metres, lying beside regional road 46 just past the hamlet of Ussin. Unlike lakes higher in the valley, it occupies an accessible position in the valley floor, with a level shoreline and picnic area. The reservoir impounds the torrent Marmore — the same stream that a few kilometres higher disappears underground through the Gouffre des Busserailles — and its engineering story is written in the dam and the hydroelectric plant nearby. Around the shore the view assembles the valley's lesser-known summits: the Punta Fontana Fredda and the Petit and Grand Tournalin to the right, the Pancherot and Monte Ersa to the left. The lake's lowland setting contrasts with the higher mountain objectives of the valley.

What to notice

The flat path around the shore reveals changing views. From the northern end the lake reads as a clean rectangle of water against pasture; from the dam end, where the Marmore resumes its course, the perspective opens down the valley toward Châtillon. The summit ring described on the official page — Tournalin and Grand Tournalin, Punta Fontana Fredda, Pancherot, Monte Ersa — frames the water on the western and southern sides, and on still mornings the peaks reflect cleanly in the basin. The lake also forms part of a working hydroelectric landscape. Near Maen, recreational facilities occupy the shore, while pools, penstocks and the power station remain visible elements of the infrastructure.

Context and history

The lake is a creation of the twentieth-century electrification of the Aosta Valley. The basin at Ussin was formed by damming the torrent Marmore to feed hydroelectric generation, and the power station by the hamlet of Maen remains part of that scheme; the little old chapel of Maen of 1724 stands nearby, now unusable, replaced by a new chapel of 1968 by the stream that keeps the crucifix and remains of the eighteenth-century altar . The surrounding hamlets — Ussin with its 1630 plague-vote chapel, Maen with its pastureland — long predate the reservoir, and the lake's shore path follows ground that was farmed and grazed for centuries before flooding. Later recreational development added public amenities to the shore. The site now reflects two histories: an industrial one of water and power, and a pastoral one of chapels and hay meadows.