Alpine summer in Kitzbuhel

Continuing on the theme of work travel, I spent a week in the beautiful alpine village of Kitzbuhel in Austria. Its more popular as a skiing location, and the last time I had visited Kitzbuhel, it was snowed over. Therefore this trip was a wonderful surprise - it was just so picturesque and breathtaking in the summer, that I felt that if we ever buy a vacation home, Austria it would be:).

Also, thankfully this time I had more time to explore the area, unlike the last time, or the recent trip to Mallorca, so enjoyed it a lot more:). Even though we were on a training, we got a couple of free hours almost everyday and I made full use of them.

Alpine villages

I was staying at the Grand Hotel and the view outside was of light green trees and grass all around in the mountains, hints of colour from the abundant wildflowers in bloom everywhere and alpine wooden houses dotting the landscape - isn't this heavenly?

It was in this view all around us, with the sun shining bright and warm temperatures around, I had to sit in the training rooms, trying to concentrate on the discussions, while all the time waiting to go out and explore another new trail or walk next to a stream or lake! I must tell you it was quite tough - waking up to such a view every morning, and looking forward to the time of the day when I could go out. It's all very tough to explain....

There is not much that I can write about what I did and experienced over the whole week - the freshness, the energy and the total upliftment of the mood! All I can say is you need to be there to experience the freshness and heavenliness of being in the mountains!

Lake Schwarzee

As I mentioned, most of the days I went out for short walks in the area. One of the days, I went to the local lake, the Schwarzee. It was a nice walk through the greens. The lake is good to swim in too, as some of my colleagues did. Or you can just walk around it in a couple of hours.

Kitzbuhel village

Then one day I just walked along the local stream up to the village of Aurach. And a couple of times, just trekked up the mountain behind the hotel. The village is also worth a quick walk, just window shop a bit, visit the church and of course, admire its colourful houses.

The weather was perfect too - though the forecast was for rain every day, it was sunny and hot (touching 25-30 degrees often). I had no idea it could be so hot in the Alps, and summer hadn't even started!!
Even though the village is small, the variety of eating places is huge. We ate at Hotel Saint Theresa one day in the city which was a typical hotel restaurant.

View from Einsiedelei

One of the days, for dinner we went to a restaurant called Waldwirtschaft Einsiedelei supposedly 20 mins away from the hotel, up the mountain behind. It finally turned out to be an hour of uphill walk, but was totally worth it for the views of the valley it offered, as well as the outdoor seating. The last day we went to hauswirth in the village of Aurach. All these places were pretty: wooden Austrian houses offering typical Austrian fare and pretty views outside. It was a bit tough to find vegetarian options though.

Overall, I loved my time there, and have a feeling got fitter too:). Its a place I would like to go back often, to be able to cycle, paraglide and do other things it offers which I did not get time to do this time around.

Till the next time!