Cycling in the Austrian Lakes - Wunderbar!

Over a year ago I saw this cycling tour in Austria and said to the others that 'I'd love to do this, what did they think?' They all thought it looked great and now we are doing it. We arrived in Unterach on Monday and stayed there until today. We did 3 days cycling from Unterach but haven't been able to show you how lovely it was until today as no internet there.


Day 1. We hopped on the schifffahrt (ferry - it really is spelt with triple f) just outside our hotel with our bikes. The weather was perfect - warm without a breath of wind and the water was crystal clear . We sat outside and marvelled at the beautiful lake, Austrian scenes and mountains. We alighted at Weyregg and did a small ride up into the valley seeing typical, perfectly kept Austrian houses and countryside. Then we rode back around Lake Attersee stopping frequently to enjoy the scenery, take photos and have lunch. Attersee is the biggest lake in Austria.

View from our dinner table at sunset

Day 2. The hotel organised for us and our bikes to be taken to St Gilgen (this was to save us having to ride up a large hill) on Wolfgangsee (another nearby lake). We then rode around this lake and through some lovely glades of trees. At one point we had to walk our bikes around a hiking trail that rose high above the lake giving us superb views. Three quarters of the way round we left our bikes and went on the cog railway to the highest peak of the area which gave us a 360 degree panorama of the lakes district. We retrieved our bikes and continued on until the end point of the road where we had to catch a ferry back. We had 3/4 hour to wait before the ferry and found a lovely afternoon tea place nearby where Glenn managed to get his first real Austrian apple strudel. He was delighted with it! We then squashed on to the ferry and then rode home back down the long steep hill we were driven up in the morning.

 

Day 3 - My favourite day so far! We set off from the hotel and rode to Mondsee. We rode around the edge marvelling at the clear, turquoise water and checking out the people enjoying their private sections of lake edge. Most of the lake frontages are privately owned but only narrow mostly not with dwellings but tables and chairs and a grassed area. We rode through Mondsee township and continued on to Irrsee. We accidentally took a wrong road and ended up on a very steep climb up through farms with lovely views. We eventually got to the lake and had a delightful swim. This lake was warmer 21 degrees and the day hit a top of 31 degrees. After this we continued round this lake and back round the other side of Mondsee back to Unterach.

  

Our lovely waiter Georg