The Valley Does Not Close When the Snow Goes

There is a version of this valley that only about half our guests ever see. The lifts stop, the ski racks come off the cars, the villages exhale, and for four months the Pinzgau turns into something completely different: green, warm in the afternoons, and startlingly empty compared with February.

If you have only ever been here in ski boots, this is what you are missing.

The reservoirs above Kaprun

The two high mountain reservoirs behind Kaprun — Wasserfallboden and, above it, Mooserboden — are the single best half-day in the area, and they are the thing we push hardest.

You do not drive the whole way. You leave the car, take a bus up the mountain road, and then ride an inclined lift up the face of a dam wall, which is a strange and slightly alarming piece of engineering and much more fun than it sounds. At the top there is a turquoise lake sitting in a bowl of rock with glaciers at the head of it, and a straightforward walking path around the water for anyone who wants one.

It is a seasonal operation — roughly from the end of May until the middle of October in a normal year, and weather dependent at both ends. Go on a clear morning. In cloud you have paid for a bus ride to see fog.

The gorge on the way

On the road up to the reservoirs is the Sigmund Thun gorge, where a wooden walkway is bolted through a slot the meltwater has cut into the rock. It takes half an hour, it costs very little, and it is loud and cold and dramatic in the best way.

It pairs naturally with the reservoirs, but it is also the correct answer to a grey afternoon. A gorge in the rain is a gorge working properly.

The cycle path along the river

The Tauern cycle path runs the length of the valley along the Salzach, and it passes within a few minutes of the chalet. It is flat, it is paved, and it is separated from the road for most of its length — which makes it the rare Alpine bike ride that a family with children can do without anyone crying.

Ride west and you are heading up towards Mittersill and eventually Krimml. Ride east and you drop gently towards Zell am See and the lake. Bikes and e-bikes are easy to hire locally, and doing one direction under your own steam and coming back on the train is a perfectly respectable plan.

The lake

The Zeller See is genuinely warm enough to swim in from midsummer, which surprises people who associate this altitude with cold water. There is a proper path all the way around it, lidos on several shores, boats you can hire, and a passenger boat that crosses it if you would rather sit down.

Fifteen minutes from the chalet, and the best cheap evening in the region: swim, walk the promenade, eat somewhere in Zell am See, drive home in the light.

The high road

If the weather is settled and you want one big day, drive the Großglockner High Alpine Road. The turn-off is about a quarter of an hour from us, and the road climbs in switchbacks to well over two thousand metres, past viewpoints, marmots and — at the far end — a terrace looking directly at Austria’s highest mountain and the glacier below it.

It is a toll road and a seasonal one, generally open from around May until late October, and it closes in bad weather without much notice. Start early. The light is better, the tour buses are not up yet, and afternoon cloud has a habit of arriving exactly when you reach the viewpoint.

And the waterfalls

Forty-five minutes up the valley at Krimml are the tallest waterfalls in Europe, dropping around 380 metres in three stages. A zigzag path climbs alongside them with viewpoints at intervals, and you can walk as much or as little of it as you like. Take a jacket you do not mind soaking, because the spray at the lower stages is not subtle.

Worth checking before you go

Opening seasons, bus and lift timetables, and the road openings above all move around with the weather and change from year to year. The shape of all this is reliable; the dates are not. Have a look at the operators’ own pages the week before you travel — and ask us when you arrive, because we will know what has actually opened.