Austria is a central European landlocked country with around 8.8 million inhabitants. The country is bordered by the Bohemian massif and the Thaya in the north, the Karawanken and the Styrian hill country in the south, the Pannonian lowlands in the east and the Rhine and Lake Constance in the west. More than 62 percent of its territory is made up of alpine high mountains.
Austria and its mountains play an important role for active holidaymakers both in winter and summer for mountain hikes, mountaineering and skiing. The highest mountains in Austria are three-thousand meter peaks and are located in the Eastern Alps. At 3,798 m, the Großglockner (Tyrol/Carinthia) is the highest mountain. Austria has numerous refuges and hiking trails that are operated by Alpine clubs and tourist associations.
Bathing tourism is particularly important on Lake Neusiedl, in the Salzkammergut and Salzburg lake areas and in the Carinthian lake area.
In general, tourism is one of the most important sectors in the Austrian economy. Tourism regions are Burgenland, Carinthia, Lower Austria, Upper Austria, Salzburg, Styria, Tyrol, Vorarlberg and Vienna.
The central location in Europe and the easy accessibility are advantageous for tourism in Austria. In the World Economic Forum's Travel and Tourism Competitiveness Report 2017, Austria ranks 12th out of 136 countries. Tourism in Austria is spread evenly between the summer and winter seasons.
The day before we noticed the first activities of the local fire brigade, which were busy building a huge canopy next to the Walserhaus: the village festival was being prepared, the first stands were being set up.
Similar to the day before, we were getting up again by the first daylight that penetrated the caravan through the skylight, as well as by the noise appearing from Breitach creek next to the campsite.
After a problem-free tour from Regensburg, we arrived at the Vorderboden campsite in the Kleinwalsertal, which is at least 1194 meters above sea level.
Not just because of the wonderful summer weather, the next diving expedition is planned to be a trip to the Blindsee, a mountain lake at 1093 meters above sea level, which is located below the Fernpass in Tyrol in Austria.
Once settled at the Vorderboden campsite in Kleinwalsertal, we set out on our first exploratory tour of Mittelberg, which is the main village of the functional exclave Kleinwalsertal alongside Baad and Riesler.
Anyone who has ever visited the capital of Austria, Vienna, will certainly have a very extensive art and culture program ahead of them and must definitely focus, especially when time is limited.
In his work, created around the middle of the 2nd century AD, Ptolemy calls the mountains between Pannonia and Norikum "Ketion oros".
Again, we noticed, there are connections that were unlikely at first, even if you are interested in history and due to our project work, we are traveling a lot, especially in the Balkans.
With its 6.3 kilometres, Halterbach is the 2nd longest stream in Vienna, which flows through the suburb of Hütteldorf in which the Camping Wien West is located, too.
The sunny weather once more lured outdoors - this time the Vienna River should be our destination and at the same time tour beginning to the Vienna Woods, where the Vienna River has its origin.
Those who drive through the city center of Vienna these days will encounter astonishing lines of visitors in the early morning already, which despite cold and light snow fall hike towards Schönbrunn Palace.
The visit to the Central Cemetery in Vienna, which was quite wet and cold but extremely interesting, had not just led us to the grave and memorial of the artist Falco, which had established itself a real visitor magnet over the years, the visit once again showed a different way of dealing with Death here in Vienna or at least here at the central cemetery.
The Wienerwald has also been populated by people since time immemorial. Neolithic residential pits, which were discovered in 1914 when trenches were dug, were found on the Simonsberg in the Weidlingbach municipality as early from the Neo-Gothic era (2200-1800 BC).
And we continued with regard to the visit of various Christmas markets in Vienna, this time we went to the Christmas market "Art Advent" at Karlsplatz.
Sunshine and the urge to move had lured us up to the jubilee area into the Vienna Woods, a kind of lookout tower on the Gallitzinberg on the western outskirts of Vienna.
Every city, like every country, has its own bizarre peculiarities, so we were more than surprised about the central cemetery in Vienna during a conversation when we found out that the cemetery is also used as a park and green area by the Viennese.
Of course, we took the advantage to pass some city areas in Vienna within our presence in Brunn am Gebirge, this time our interest was mostly directed to one of the buildings of the Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser, which were planned and implemented together with his architect friend Josef Krawina.
Once again we took the tram into the city center of Vienna, leaving the tram at Vienna State Opera. This time, our exploration tour was to include the Vienna Hofburg and the museums housed in it, where our special interest was directed to the Ephesus Museum.
If you want to enjoy the ultimate, almost oriental market experience in Vienna, you should visit the Brunnenmarkt in Ottakring, which we were able to do thanks to our city guide Gernot.
During extensive canal construction work in 1948, the remains of the tribunal houses of the legionary warehouse Vindobona were discovered at the Hohenmarkt in Vienna.