4d recently spent Friday night at the Berggasthof at the top of the cable car on the Rax mountain. We took the train and bus to the Hirschwang and then took Austria’s oldest cable car up to the top. The views were spectacular, despite the poor visibility – there was so much Sahara sand in the air that we were sure we saw some camels floating about…
We went for a nice hike to the Ottohaus, where we stopped for an ice-cream before going up to the summit cross on the Jakobskogel (1737m). We then returned via the Scheiblingwiese and Lochboden. The original plan was to walk to the neue Seehütte, but the weather was highly unpredictable and due to all the dust it was impossible to see if any bad weather was approaching, so we erred on the side of caution. Funnily enough, none of the kids were disappointed that our hike was considerably shorter than planned…
The following morning we awoke to pretty stormy weather, with a very strong wind and rain as well. Fortunately the wind died down after our excellent breakfast and the sun came out, too. Well, it did above the clouds, anyway. Our walk over to the Höllentalaussicht provided us with a nice view of fog, as we were standing right in the middle of the cloud base. It does look very nice when the weather’s good, though.
We then returned to the cable car for a safe journey back down the mountain. All in all, a very nice way to spend a Friday afternoon and Saturday morning.
Many thanks to the Scharfegger family for being so accommodating and looking after us so well. Thanks also to Fabienne for organising our stay.