The crater
From the rim.
Dupisingh — CC BY-SA 3.0 · Abhideo21 — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Dhruva Punde — CC BY-SA 4.0 · Biswas Dibyendu — CC0 · NASA — Public domain
Lonar Lake is a salty soda lake in Buldhana district of Maharashtra, about 1.8 km in a straight line south-west of the small town of Lonar. It fills a crater formed by a high-speed meteorite impact, the only crater lake of meteoritic origin in India, and it is protected as a National Geological Monument and a Ramsar wetland. The crater is about 1.8 km across and 150 m deep, cut into the volcanic basalt of the Deccan Plateau, which dates to around 66 million years ago. The crater's own age is debated: earlier studies put it at about 52,000 years, while later dating suggested around 570,000 years. The lake water is salty and strongly alkaline, and it has no outlet. From the rim, the near-circular crater opens below you, its slopes covered in dry forest that turns green after the monsoon, with the oval lake at the bottom. A stepped path leads down through the trees to the shore, and old temples stand on the slopes and near the water. In 2020 the lake briefly turned pink, a change scientists linked to microorganisms living in the salty water. Visiting the rim is free. The walk down and back takes about two hours and is hot in the dry season, so start early and carry water; the monsoon and the months after it are the greenest.
From the rim.
At the bottom.
On the slopes.
Buldhana district, Maharashtra, India
Yes, a stepped path takes about two hours there and back.
During and after the monsoon, when the crater is green.