A country crossed by train in five hours, from a Vienna coffee house to a Tyrolean cable car — so you choose the order, not the country
Austria is chosen not between city and mountain but by order and by month: the east, with Vienna, works all year, the lakes only in summer, and the Alps have two seasons with a gap between them, when the lifts stand still. You move between the parts by train, so the plan follows the railway rather than the map.
The east — Vienna, the Wachau and Graz — does not depend on the season; December adds the Advent markets and January and February the balls. The lakes are for swimming from June to September, and those are the months when the Salzkammergut and Carinthia make sense. The mountains have winter for skiing, December to March, and summer for walking, when most lifts in Tyrol run from May to October. April and November are the gap: the lifts are in for servicing and some mountain huts are shut. Hence the decision — travel in April or November and you choose cities; want mountain and lake on one trip and you go June to September; want Vienna and snow and you go in December or January.
Each place has its own page — what makes it worth the detour, and how long you need.
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The ten places on this site sit on two railway lines. The western line runs Vienna–Linz–Salzburg: Linz is an hour and a quarter from Vienna, Salzburg two hours twenty-five. From Salzburg to Innsbruck there are two routes — the quicker one, about two hours, and the one through the Alps via Zell am See and Kitzbühel, so those two need no backtracking. Hallstatt is done from Salzburg. The southern line runs Vienna–Graz, two hours thirty-five, and since December 2025 continues on the Koralm railway to Klagenfurt in about forty minutes. So the plan runs in a line or a loop — Vienna, the west, then the south back to Vienna — rather than in spokes from the capital.
Viennese coffee house culture was entered in 2011 in Austria's national inventory of intangible cultural heritage, kept by the Austrian Commission for UNESCO — not on the international UNESCO list. The entry names marble tables, Thonet chairs and newspaper tables, and calls the coffee house a place where time and space are consumed but only the coffee appears on the bill.
Vienna is supplied with spring water from the Rax and Schneeberg mountains, through a pipeline opened in 1873, and it is the same water that runs from the tap and from the street fountains.
Vienna holds more than 450 balls a year, most of them in January and February — from the Opera Ball to the balls of professions and associations.
About 700 hectares of vineyards lie within Vienna's city limits. Winemakers pour their own young wine in Heurigen, taverns on the edge of town, and an open Heuriger is marked by a green branch over the door.
The Grossglockner, at 3,798 metres, is Austria's highest peak. The road beneath it, the Grossglockner Hochalpenstrasse, runs from late April to early November, snow permitting, and is tolled separately from the vignette.
The Hotel Sacher and the Demel pastry shop fought over the name 'original Sachertorte' until the dispute ended in a settlement in 1963: the hotel sells the Original Sacher-Torte, Demel the Eduard-Sacher-Torte. Both are still sold in central Vienna, each under its own name.
This isn't a ranking — it's a route. Any one of these could carry a whole trip.
The start of the trip for almost anyone arriving by air, since the country opens up from here by train to the west and the south. For anyone more interested in museums, music and coffee houses than in nature; if you come for the mountains, give Vienna a day or two at the start or end, not the whole trip.
A city at a junction: from here you reach the Salzkammergut and, to the south, Zell am See, while Innsbruck and Vienna are two to two and a half hours away by train. For anyone who wants the city and the lakes from one place to stay — it is worth more as a base than as a one-day stop.
For anyone giving the Salzkammergut a single day. The railway station is on the far shore of the lake, so you arrive in the village by boat. For the village without the day groups, sleep there or come on the first train.
For anyone who wants the Alps without a car: the city is on the main line, and the mountain begins behind the last street. In summer it is a base for trails, in winter for skiing; in April and November, while the lifts are being serviced, it loses half its reason to visit.
For anyone who wants a day out of Vienna that is not the mountains: terraced vineyards, Melk Abbey and the Danube, by bike or boat. Melk and Krems sit at the two ends of the valley and both have trains to Vienna, so you cross it in one direction without doubling back.
For anyone who wants lake and snow in summer: the Kitzsteinhorn glacier above Kaprun has a lift all year, so this place does not depend on the shoulder season the way the rest of the Alps does. It sits on the mountain line from Salzburg to Innsbruck, which makes it a stop on the way rather than a detour.
In 1918 Austria went from an empire of fifty million people to a republic of six million, practically overnight. The new state was first called German Austria, and a treaty forbade it from joining Germany.
The Semmering railway of 1854 was the first mountain line in Europe built to standard gauge, with tunnels and viaducts through terrain thought impassable. It is UNESCO listed and still carries scheduled trains.
Short answers to what people ask most before setting out.
Yes, for all motorways and expressways: ten days cost €12.80, one day €9.60. The trap is buying online — a digital vignette bought over the internet by a consumer is valid only from the eighteenth day, because of the right of withdrawal; bought at a petrol station, a tobacconist or a toll station, it is valid at once. From February 2027 only the digital one exists. The Grossglockner road and some alpine tunnels are tolled separately.
Four days cover Vienna with a day in the Wachau. A week is Vienna for three days, Salzburg with Hallstatt for two and Innsbruck for two, all by train on the western line. Ten days allow the south as well — Graz and Klagenfurt — closing the loop back to Vienna.
Not for the cities and the main alpine bases: Vienna, Linz, Salzburg, Innsbruck, Kitzbühel, Zell am See, Graz and Klagenfurt are all on the railway, and Hallstatt has a station with a boat across the lake. A car makes sense for the Grossglockner road and for valleys the train does not reach.
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All photographs come from Wikimedia Commons and are used under the licence stated beside each one.
