Kaltenberg Hutte

Austria walking holiday Day 1 July 2024 Buxted to Innsbruck and then the first walk to Kaltenberg Hutte

Practicality over fashion parade, the two walkers set out for the mountains

My brother John had had done 100% of the planning for this trip as well as a great deal of prep walking up steep inclines and even achieving the accolade of a virtual walk to the peak of Everest! Albeit over a period of several months. I had done nothing other than a few walks up and down Nan Tucks Lane and a cloudy walk up to Mount Caburn with John the day before our departure. 

The reality of the difficulty of what we would be taking on came when John took me through the itinerary and a 3D tour over every boulder, brook and snow drift that we would be traversing. Gulp! He was clearly nervous too. Seven years my elder, his oft repeated ‘one rule’ was ‘it’s not a race’. 

The inevitable early start and the irksome journey to Gatwick on what is left of the roads of Sussex went without any great drama and once we had negotiated the surprisingly efficient Easyjet self bag drop, it was time for the cattle run through the military grade control of airport security. With only a few bits in a shoulder strap bag and an incredibly lax approach to walking boots being kept on, we were through and buying over priced coffee in Pret before you could say ‘that’s just a rip off’. 

Troubles left over from the world wide outage on the busiest flying day for five years didn’t affect us at all and the short flight across the Alps to Innsbrook was going great. There were glimpses of the mountains that we would be walking over in the days to come and the occasional view of picture postcard chalets strung along lush valleys where you just know there’ll be men in lederhosen yodeling at their sheep in the morning. 

I remembered Will’s comment that the landing strip at Innsbrook was a ‘Captains only’ approach at the very same moment that our pilot lurched the plane upwards and out of the low cloud that was, we were calmly advised, making it difficult to see where to go! Circling around to a different approach, we were safely back on the ground fifteen minutes or so later. Clapping ensued which, of course, I wouldn’t normally condone but on this occasion it felt at least a little justified. 

John was in full project manager organising mode and the taxi driver was summoned ahead of schedule. This was due mainly to the fact that the place was less like an international airport and more akin to a bus station of a resort that had long since lost its allure of mass tourism. This, by the way, is not a bad thing and it unassumingly set the tone for the experience to come. 

Jenner the driver duly arrived and, after a few awkward minutes of conversation in broken English / German where it was established that no meaningful conversation was going to happen, we spent an hours drive in silence until arriving at the start of the trail in St Christoph. The journey had involved a lot of tunnels with road works going on, some high speed driving and lots of pretty shingle clad houses within which people were no doubt eating Weiner snitchel and practicing yodaling. 

It was a little tense when we first arrived at the head of our starting point due to the fact that the restaurant that had been selected for lunch was shut! Luckily there was an alternative a few hundred yards up the road which had a soup option for John and, what I saw as the obligatory choice, Weiner Schnitzel for me. When in Rome Rodney.

The hiking commenced with a 450’ climb over a half mile distance. This didn’t mean anything to me either in terms of understanding the scale of altitude gain over distance versus leg pain and accelerated heart rate but I quickly found out! Quite a lot of leg pain for what seemed like little gain coupled with a sinking feeling of bitting off more than I can fit in my groaning stomach!

Once on top of the plain though the first taste of the local landscape laid itself out before us and it was breathtakingly spectacular! I was particularly struck by the vibrancy of the spectrum of colour. The greens were lusher and brighter than at home, the sky bluer and the flinty grays of the rock faces sharper and more rugged. Even the regular and reassuring way markers paint red and white along the way felt chirpy and assured. 

The going was easy for 3 miles now through a spectacular and idillic valley that felt so remote from the busy overpopulated world of Gatwick Airport where we had been only a few hours earlier. There were some links to civilisation with the occasional off key dink donk of a cow bell and an incongruous piece of brutalist architecture venting a road tunnel way below our feet. 

We were soon upon the base of another climb with a similar accent and distance to the first. This time though it seemed altogether easier as at the end stood Kaltenberg Hutte and with it our first night’s accommodation.

Built by the army in the 1930s as staging posts for vigorous hikes for the Hitler youth, the Hüttes in the Austrian Alps still stand as resting places for those seeking the invigorating and exhilarating challenges of the Alpine peaks. And, just as they were in those dark times gone by, they are full of alphas! 

They come with a set of rules that are probably clearly detailed in the many signs on the walls but there is no quarter for those that can’t read German and we are left to stumble through the entry and check in procedures. Boots and walking poles must be stored at the bottom of the building and thereafter, sliders are required. Strict rules apply to meal times, bed times, washing times and everything else times!

We are pleased to find that our allocated room is only for two and is at the end of the corridor with a splendid view down to the valley below. Whilst some aspects of the building have been upgraded from the 1930s original, it would appear that the creaky bunk bed hadn’t and this was very obvious from the loud creaking ripping through the air as I climbed up to the top. (John, eight years my senior, pulled rank and the greater need for night time weeing!)

We sat on the terrace to enjoy a beer before dinner at six sharp in the spartan canteen room. We all had the same beef broth starter, slab of pork sauerkraut and dumpling main and a heavy stodge of cake for pudding. (the deference to vegetarians had happened since John’s last visit 25 years ago but we had not been made aware of this by the shouty but very pleasant host). It was basic, good and filling. 

All we needed now was a good night’s sleep to prepare ourselves for the more challenging hike tomorrow…

Sadly, sleeping was more challenging than expected with first a lot of crashing and bashing of doors for what seemed like forever after the official lights out at 10 and then a lot of chatter that was clearly heard through the wafer thin walls and floors followed through the night with a steady creaking of beds generated as the full hütte struggled to gain a comfortable position on the rock hard kid sized beds. I was very conscious that John was probably cursing every move I made and that resulted in an even less conducive frame of mind for relaxing into slumber. 

At around 2 in the morning the rain started and then persisted through to breakfast bouncing off the tin roof directly outside of our window. Meh! 

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Konstanzer Hütte

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Five Years at Farthings