Stage 04 From Glacier to Wine North Route Bad Mitterndorf - Tauplitzalm

This stage of the hiking route "From Glacier to Wine" is one of the few where it really is almost entirely uphill, but from Bad Mitterndorf (Tourist Information Tel. +43 3623 2444) initially quite comfortable. Only at the end, from the beautiful Öderntal to the Tauplitzalm, the climb becomes a bit more strenuous. We leave Bad Mitterndorf in a northerly direction and march along a small stream until we reach a fork in the path, where we keep left to enter Öderntal. On the right, at this fork in the road, you can also reach the Tauplitzalm (a somewhat shorter variant), but the path across the Öderntal is much more scenic. Always along the valley past the Kochalmbauer homestead, we reach a crossroads just after the Albrechtshütte (hunting lodge of the Federal Forests), where we keep to the right to continue hiking quite comfortably along the Öderntal. Next stop is the rustic Steinbrecherhütte of the Sonnleitner family (Tel. +43 664 5195516) at 1,200 m above sea level.

From here begins the ascent to the Tauplitzalm, which leads us on this tour around the Lawinenstein, a beautiful lookout mountain on the Tauplitzalm. The path climbs steadily up to the alpine pasture, sometimes in serpentines. On the mountain pasture we are greeted by the Großsee, one of the numerous lakes on this beautiful high plateau. To the right is the imposing Lawinenstein, a balcony-like lookout mountain with a beautiful view over the Ausseerland-Salzkammergut region with Bad Mitterndorf on one side and the area of Lake Grundlsee on the other. But a special moment for us is certainly the view from the Lawinenstein back to the Dachstein with its glacier, our starting point of the hiking route "From Glacier to Wine". On the mountain slope of the Lawinenstein, which can be reached from the Tauplitzalm in about 1.5 hours, there are several gorges and a weather hole that leads almost vertically down into the earth. It is said that if someone throws a stone in there, a heavy thunderstorm will break out on the same day.

The range of accommodation on the Tauplitzalm, our stage destination, extends from the romantic alpine hut to the best-run hotel (Tourist Information Tel. +43 3688 2446). And all of them have one thing in common besides their coziness: here we will also get the best advice about our next stage to the Hochmölbinghütte.