A skiing holiday without any skiing?

"A last-minute trip to the Austrian Tirol,” I thought, “how very sporty and adventurous of us! We’ll learn to ski with great aplomb, sit in mountain chalets sipping gluwein and sampling apple strudel, then skim athletically down the crisp white mountainside in time for a quick schnapps and a sauna before supper….”

Actually, it didn’t work out quite like that. We did manage to bag a bargain on the internet for a week’s half board, flights and transfers to the resort of Mayrhofen in Austria, a beautiful little town nestled in the Ziller valley and cosseted by snow-capped peaks… and yes, it was like being an extra in Heidi. We stayed in the wonderful Hotel Pension Alpina run by the charming Frau Hauser and her most incredibly hospitable family, ate fresh bread and coffee every morning in the pine booths of the breakfast room, sweated in the sauna surrounded by naked Germans, chatted by the bar to the other (fully clothed) guests, and feasted on the traditional home-cooked Tirolean delicacies provided by Frau Hauser’s kitchen.

But as for the skiing??? Nope. A horrendous cold which had plagued me for two weeks prior to our departure had the audacity to turn into an ear infection, and the journey up the mountain by cable car on the Saturday of arrival nearly had me in tears, so skiing was off the menu… and a lack of snow low down in the valley meant that tobogganing and skidooing were also no go. And annoyingly, all the ski schools courses start on the Sunday so we couldn’t start half way through the week if my ears improved.So what to do? Would there be enough to do to satisfy not only my cultural urges but also one very easily bored husband? Actually yes.

Unlike rural areas in this country, Mayrhofen has an excellent integrated public transport system and a little narrow gauge railway that ploughs up and down the Ziller valley, thus connecting into the main transport system, so it’s actually very easy and cheap to explore. The nearest little railway station was about a kilometre away from our hotel in the hamlet of Schwendau, so every morning we would ramble downhill, past wooden chalets and farmhouses, under the greenest of hills and whitest mountain peaks, and over a crystal clear river to wait with all the skiers and locals for the next little train.

An hour away is the city of Innsbruck and its famous Golden Roof, medieval streets and excellent coffee houses, but far more fun was Salzburg. Elegant little shopping streets and bustling market squares are crossed by the clip-clop of horse and buggy rides, while overhead towers the castle, reached by a funicular cable-car ride. We had a lovely lunch at the top of the fort, bathing in the sunshine before exploring the exhibitions on p uppets, WWII uniforms, a medieval audience chamber and models of the castle through the ages, whilst battling through groups of American students with expensive orthodontistry. Mozart’s old house is also open to the public and contains a fascinating insight into his life, complete with personal-audio-guide; even the husband was interested by the bolt-shooting display and was pleasantly shocked by Mozart’s filthy sense of humour and paintings of bottoms. And of course we had to have sachertorte in one of the many cafes, as Salzburg is home to a branch of the famous Hotel Sacher where you can see beautiful displays of boxed gateaux in the windows and not be able to afford one of them.

Mayrhofen is also excellent walking country, with maps available of the many marked walking routes; our favourite was a desperate clamber up to the Steiner Kogl, a guesthouse perched high on the mountain above the town. Pausing only to cough and sit down every hundred yards we eventually staggered in and ordered hot chocolates, before it started to chuck it down. Naturally not having an umbrella or any proper clothing we decided to walk back down the path on other side of the mountain through dense pine forest. As any mountaineer will tell you, coming back down is far harder on the muscles than going up, and the only thing that kept our spirits going as we trudged through dripping branches down pine-needle crusted switchbacks was Dan yodelling “high on the hill was a grumpy husband” as his blisters swelled while I fell over a lot. Great fun, one of our better days out, I feel.

The highlight of our non-skiing skiing trip was undoubtedly snow-shoeing, thankfully wearing modern plastic snowshoes rather than tennis rackets à la Wimbledon circa 1924. We booked this thro ugh one of the Inghams reps that proved to be so helpful with info such as train timetables and après-ski activities, and it was just such a blast! We were picked up from the hotel by our guide Walter, driven half way up a deserted mountain and forced to walk the rest of the way up, trudging across virgin snow, over crystal mountain streams and through the laden boughs of beautiful snowy pine forests. The pace was slow and plodding (we had warned him that we were unfit and unschooled) but remarkably easy, though the last ten minutes took its toll on our thighs.

We stopped for a rest at one of the wooden cabins used by the farmers when their cows are grazing on the summer pastures and Walter unpacked possibly one of the nicest treats I can remember, pouring out a cup of steaming hot fruit tea and honey for both of us, plus a crusty ham roll and a bar of chocolate. It’s absolutely true what they say about food tasting better outdoors, that was the best picnic I can remember (and I have had a few!). Walter was also extremely knowledgable about all the local flora and fauna, and taught us how to read the tracks of animals in the snow. “Look, zere iz ze tracks of ze rabbit, and zis iz ze fox, and here ze rabbit iz jumping, and there iz ze fox running hard and oh dear, ah, vell, zis is a nice deer for you instead…”

Actually the rabbit got away, but something scared the deer and his tracks were broken by a leap of around three metres. Felt just like Daniel Day Lewis in Last of the Mohicans.
Did I mention the horse and cart rides, the spas, the swimming pools, the shopping, the wandering and enjoying the most pristine of scenery, people-watching whilst drinking coffee in the sunshine, the après-ski camaraderie in the hotel in the evenings?? Yup, I can’t wait to not go skiing again.....