An interesting place to say the least. The town itself is built on a steeply tiered valley and is virtually dead. Decadent buildings suggest it had a heyday once, but its like a ghost town.
Up at the higher level is the newer part where the skiing starts and finishes art around 1000m so not at all high. However, the modern gondola soon whisks you up to 2251m at Stubnerkogl, from where you can ski on the front of the local mountain, or round the back and down into Angertal at 1175m, from where you can again rise up to 2050 at Schlossalm above Bad HofGastein where this is a plateau with some nice runs well linked.
Off the very top at 2300m there is a fantastic long red down the back into Bad HofGastein, known locally as the Aeroplane Run because of the Hutte near the bottom at Kitzstein.
Up the valley and 15 mins on the free regular ski bus is SportGastein starting at 1590m and going up to 2686m do notably better snow all over the mountain here. Lovely long sweeping runs, but more exposed and prone to closure in a storm as it gets the wind. You can spend a good day exhausting this area, we were lucky it was cold and sunny and conditions were about as perfect as you could get. Quiet slopes, modern lifts many with heated seats, and superb grooming. Sadly, no snow in 3 weeks meant pretty much no off piste to have a crack at so it was 99% piste skiing all week.
Down the valley is DorfGastein at 830m with good lifts taking you up to 2027m at the very top, but wierdly this place has a micro climate of its own, and the snow down here was better than anywhere else, that is until after lunch when the sun beat down on it. Lower slopes on the run off remained open incredibly, although it was a tough combination of slush in the sun and sheet ice in the shade. Like skiing in April, not January.
Dorf is linked over the back to Grossarl, and we found this to be our favourite area to ski, albeit a 30 minute bus ride away and involving a change half way annoyingly. There is a good selection of slopes here, with some fantastic reds off the top both sides, we blasted these all morning the 2 days out of 6 we visited them. Again, quiet slopes with modern efficient lifts, typical Austria.
Food was plentiful, very well priced, and delicious in every mountain hut and restaurant we tried. Local Strudel was excellent. Coffee was around 2,50 euros, a large beer between 3,50 and 3,90, spag bol 7,90 and Schnitzal and chips 10,90.
Unfortunately, we didnt have a good experience with the company we travelled with. The hotel wasnt really up to the standards they had suggested, nothing like the norm for Austria anyway. Food was ok, but portions far too small, and some of the staff made life uncomfortable at times. Put it this way - none of our group will be using this company again for a number of reasons.
Anyway, that aside, and despite being the worst conditions I have ever actually skied in at times in certain parts of the area, we had a blast and covered virtually every single marked piste. I ventured off piste with one of the others in our group one morning down the back of Stubnerkogl where we saw a number of people heading, but it turned into a bit of a nightmare with gulleys, streams, trees and no way down, so we hiked for half an hour with skis in hand before skiing down through some trees and stumbling across a red path which led us joyously out to a cafe close to a major lift station. 90 minutes of not enjoyable ski time!!!!
It would, of course, been a lot better with decent conditions. Austria seems to be the place suffering this season, and January is usually a good month but it just is not cold. One lift station read 12c but it was pretty much above 0c all day every day, except for some shaded areas facing north where good snow remained intact. The ski off each night became more and more demanding, interesting, testing and challenging to say the least.
Its a nice area with good valley views, and some really cracking long pistes, but its badly disjointed and you need buses or cars to get about. They claim 220km of piste, and we covered pretty much all of it in a week, much of it a couple of times, but you do feel like you are travelling to different areas to ski which was nice. I wont be going back though.
I will post more and some photos later this week.
In the meantime, anyone heading out to Austria and in particular the Salzburg area, pack the sun cream, consider renting skis rather than taking your own, and dont even think about thermals or layering up. For now, at least.
