Cabin Fever

Nothing captures the spirit of Salzburgerland quite like a hut-to-hut hike to soak up the mountain scenery.

- Ianthe Butt

When most people think of Salzburgerland’s famous Alpine scenery, they think of ski slopes and powder-white snow. A skier’s dream in winter, this landscape transforms into a hiker’s paradise come spring, when just a meringue-crumble of snow remains on the highest peaks. Emerald slopes carpeted with bluebells and edelweiss appear, crisscrossed with walking trails that can be visited right through to autumn.

Despite being phenomenally pretty, and under a 30-minute-drive south of Salzburg Airport, Salzburgerland’s hiking trails remain under the radar. On a four-day visit, I decide to dip my boot-clad toes into two of its highlights, local guides in tow.

I first take in a portion of the picturesque 217-mile Salzburger Almenweg in Grossarltal, hiking hut to hut (there are 40 here), then two days trail-wandering in the nearby Gastein Valley. In Grossarltal we pass ruddy-cheeked locals, and hyperactive mountain goats butting heads, and alternate brisk, up-and-down walks through valleys with stops at family-run mountain huts, where, generations of weary-limbed hikers have fuelled up on homemade speck and cheese plates.

Before bedding down for the night at a rustic dorm room in a hut at the chalet-style Ellmau Alm, we watch the sun slipping down behind fog-swathed peaks.

The hospitality of the hosts — some sporting traditional lederhosen and dirndls — is as fulsome as the crystal-clear streams that rush down the mountainsides.