Pertisau is on the shores of the Achensee in northern Austria, just the other side of the Karwendelgebirge from Leutasch. The 8-mile long lake fills a deep glacial valley dammed by a moraine that stops the water flowing down into the Inn valley to the south. We stayed at the Hotel Wiesenhof which is family-run. Although it has expanded over the years it still has a welcoming atmosphere – and a huge, well-equipped spa/sauna area for those who like that kind of thing.
Pertisau is a ski resort in winter, and in summer there are all manner of outdoor activities on offer including wind-surfing on the water and hang-gliding above it. In high summer you can swim in it but it was a bit chilly when I tested it. We were there for the walking – and flowers of course! There is a good bus service for the whole of the Achensee area; passes are available from the hotel. There is also a lake ferry with five jetties, one of which connects with the steam-hauled rack railway that runs down to the mainline at Jenbach. (Timber used to be cut and rolled into the lake, floated down to Seespitz and then taken out by rail.) The boats in the ferry fleet are built in the boatyard at Pertisau.
[Click on the thumbnails for bigger pictures.]
| Night view from hotel. I couldn’t resist propping the camera on the balcony. | |
| View from bedroom. The same view the following morning. It had been a very warm spring so there was relatively little snow on the tops. | |
| Old farmhouse in Pertisau. Pertisau is now very much a (nice) holiday resort with most of the buildings now hotels or guest-houses, but there are still one or two traditional old farmhouses like this one. | |
| Signpost. A typical walkers’ signpost – notice how the “distances” are given as times, which makes a lot more sense in mountain country. We found the timings were about right, perhaps slightly on the optimistic side. | |
| Birdsnest Orchid. Not a terribly good picture, but an interesting plant that grows as a parasite on the roots of beeches, usually in deep shade. It has no leaves (just small scales) and the whole above-ground part is honey-coloured, up to a foot tall. This was the only specimen I saw. | |
| Forest path. Just a typical view in the forest that covers most of the lower slopes (the birdsnest orchid was just a llittle behind me). | |
| Lake view. Achensee seen through a gap in the trees | |
| Yellow wood violets. The delightful little violas only seemed to grow in a relatively narrow altitude band in the forests. The flowers are about the same size as our dog violets. | |
| Trumpet gentian. Gentians are common on the grassy slopes either in woodland clearings or above the tree line. There were several species, of which these were probably the most impressive with flowers a couple of inches tall. The photo doesn’t really do justice to the vibrant, glowing blue. | |
| Mountain avens. These are a rare treat in England, but very much at home on the rocks here in the Alps. | |
| Alpine clematis. | |
| Tunnel on footpath. Even the footpaths are beautifully engineered, with a corniche section complete with tunnels – not a place for vertigo sufferers! | |
| Spring gentians. | |
| Whorled Solomons seal. (I think...) | |
| Weissenbach Alm. | |
| Near Weissenbach Alm. | |
| Coming down from Weissenbach Alm. | |
| Weissenbach Alm. One of the Alpine “Hütte” offering good lunchtime snacks on the way. | |
| Water trough. Typical trough cut from a tree-trunk for the cows. | |
| White orchid. Another not-very-good picture of an orchid growing in deep shade in the woods! | |
| Forest track. | |
| Butterflies. This group of mixed butterflies was milling about on what looked like an animal dropping, presumably to extract minerals or perhaps moisture. Guy Padfield has identified them for me as “small tortoiseshell, getting trampled in all the excitement, and a couple of grizzled skippers too. The fritillaries are knapweed fritillaries”. I have a small video [2.4Mb] of them (sorry about the soundtrack, it was windy). | |
| Near Seespitz. Seespitz is at the southern end of the lake, where the rack railway from Jenbach terminates – and meets the steamer – you can just see the jetty to the right.. | |
| Windsurfers. The wind was beginning to get up, and an hour or so later it was at gale force. This was the Föhn wind, and presaged a change in the weather. | |
| Hotel Wiesenhof. | |
Unfortunately the weather broke and we saw a different face of the lake. The 23km walk around the lake was more challenging than we anticipated, with one section being very steep and rugged.
| Lake ferry. Sailing across from Gaisalm to Buchau. There is a road along the right hand side of the lake but not the left. |  |
| Whitebeam at Gaisalm. This is apparently the only alm (alpine pasture with a restaurant/café) that can be reached on foot or by water, but not by road. This very shapely whitebeam (Sorbus sp.) was growing near the boat dock. |  |
| Gaisalm boat dock. |  |
| Lakeside path near Gaisalm. Running north from Gaisalm the path climbs very steeply and clings to the rock face, sometimes with quite unnerving vertical drops tothe water below. Where it crosses rivulets there are footbridges... |  |
| Gaisalm. Looking back. |  |
The rain we suffered at lake level yesterday had fallen as snow on the higher ground, above about 1500m – which together with the very clear air behind the weather system gave us some wonderful views on a walk starting from Maurach at the southern end of Achensee.
| Hotel with snow on mountains. |  |
| View towards Maurach from near Astenau. |  |
| St Notburga chapel. St Not(h)burga was a local girl, and many of the area’s churches and chapels are dedicated to her. |  |
| Dwarf daphne. Growing near the tree line, this little gem is only a couple of inches tall. It has a similar scent to the more familiar garden daphne or mezereon. |  |
| Lake with Lärchenwiese. |  |
| Milkwort. A rather more robust species than our British ones. |  |
| Buchauer Alm. |  |
| Mountain cornflower. |  |
| Hang-glider. The meadows around the hotel were used as the landing area for the many hang-gliders (who take one of the ski lifts up the mountains and glide down). |  |
| Shield. ...of the Entner family who run the hotel. Ente is German for duck, so it seems appropriate. This is the door to the dining room and breakfasr buffet. |  |
| Wiesenhof terrace. |  |
| Clouds from hotel. More weather brewing... |  |
Day 4 was a wash-out, with very low cloud and rain almost all day – we did manage to get out for a walk over the Feilalm but there were no pictures. The following day we had much better luck, with more fresh snow and clear air for the views. We went over the Pasillsattel on the west side of the lake and down into Achenkirch. On a summer’s day you could go over the Seespitze and along the summit ridge if you were an experienced mountain walker.
| Pompom plant. This curious little plant was locally very common on rocks higher up the slopes. |  |
| Fresh snow near Pasillsattel. |  |
| Pasillsattel. The col, with the ever-helpful signpost and red-and-white waymark. |  |
| Snowbells. |  |
| View near Pasill Alm. |  |
| Folded rocks on Seespitz. |  |
| Folded rocks from Pasillsattel. Round to the right of those in the previous photo. The light covering of snow really shows up the bedding – extraordinary to think of the enormous energy required to bend rock like that! |  |
| Beccy in Alpine meadow above Pasill Alm. |  |
| Achenkirch from near Seekaralm. Achenkirch is the village at the northern end of the lake. There is no direct road to it from Pertisau. |  |
| Waiting for the boat. |  |
| Sailing from Achenkirch. |  |
| Achensee from boat. |  |
| Boat at Pertisau. |  |
| Fish waterspout. In Pertisau village. |  |
| Pertisau – General view. |  |
| Auto lawnmower. This fascinated me: it spent all day (and some of the night) roving over the lawns at a slow walking pace. Whenever it encountered a tree or flower-bed, or the edge of the hotel’s land, it turned (sometimes right around) and carried on; when it ran low on battery it took itself off to its feeding station and plugged itself in. Apparently there is a wire buried in the ground to tell it where to stop at the edge of the garden. |  |
| Moon over Pertisau. |  |
| Sonnjoch from hotel. Clear morning light... |  |
| Dalfaz waterfall. We took the bus to Buchau for this walk, which climbed steeply up above the lake to this spectacular but well hidden waterfall. |  |
| Lake from Dalfaz. |  |
| Achensee from Teissl Alm. |  |
| Path up to Dalfaz Alm. The classic Alpine footpath, with zig-zags to ease the gradient (but increase the distance walked); this would be about two hours from the lake. |  |
| Dalfaz Alm. A welcome break at the col. |  |
| View from Dalfaz Alm. |  |
| From Dalfaz Alm. This was the busiest of the mountain huts we visited, mainly because it is an easy walk from the top of the Rofan cable-car. Note the bird on the fence: an Alpine chough, one of many that were quite tame and begging for scraps. |  |
| Chough. This was as close as I could get. It shows the yellow beak but does not do justice to the orange legs of this jackdaw-like bird. The flock made a very characteristic noise as the birds called to each other. |  |
| 16 hours to Munich. Perhaps not today.... |  |
| Path leading from Dalfaz Alm. Contouring round to the cable-car station |  |
| Windsock near Durrakreuz. This is close to the launching point for the hang-glider pilots who come up on the cable-car. Looks very scary to me. |  |
| Boats on Achensee from near Durrakreuz. |  |
| View SE to high Alps. Which must be at least 50 miles away. |  |
| Lärchenwiese with Jenbach to left. Jenbach, in the main Inn valley, is a sizeable town with a mainline station, and quite a bit of industry such as furniture-making. Lärchenwiese sits on the moraine dam of the lake which is off the picture to the right. |  |
| Path to Rofan cable car. |  |
| Rofan cable car station. |  |
| Info board at Rofan. There are obviously many high-level paths to walk in the summer, coming up on the cable-car to save time! We took it down to Maurach (and then got the bus back although we could have walked if we’d had an extra hour and a bit more energy). |  |
| Early morning. Probably the best weather we had, just as we were about to leave. |  |
| Wiesenhof terrace area. We didn’t have the whole day, so relaxed in and around the hotel. |  |
| Games table. One of several beautifully inlaid wooden tables in the hotel (the others have chess, backgammon and nine-men’s-morris boards) for indoor games – this is a local version of something like Ludo. The tables are all made in Pertisau from locally grown wood from different species and are absolutely wonderful. So, even if it rains there is something to do. |  |