Abano Terme Geography

The town stands at the eastern edge of the Euganean Hills, where a group of extinct volcanic cones rises abruptly out of the otherwise flat Venetian plain, ten kilometres south-west of Padua.

The hills are the remains of volcanic activity of some 35 million years ago -- trachyte and basalt domes, most of them rounded and wooded, rising to just over 600 metres at Monte Venda. They form a regional park.

The thermal system is the defining geological fact. Rainfall on the Little Dolomites, some 80 kilometres north, sinks into the limestone and travels south through deep aquifers, heating as it goes and dissolving mineral salts, before rising along the fault lines at the edge of the volcanic massif. The journey takes roughly twenty-five to thirty years and the water emerges at about 87 degrees.

The town itself is flat, at around 14 metres above sea level, with the hills immediately to the west and the plain running east toward Padua and the lagoon.