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Lungau Resort Review Austria

Personally I am a bit of a sucker, and maybe slightly biased, when it comes to Austria as a ski destination. Recently, my girlfriend and I enjoyed four days skiing in the Lungau region and were definitely not let down with everything that it had to offer.

As we only had four days available we wanted to head somewhere that had a quick transfer time to allow us to maximize our ski time. With that in mind, having spent two years in the Salzburger Sportwelt and being fascinated with this area, we wanted to explore a little further. Lungau is around 1 hour and 20 minutes from Salzburg airport, and with British Airways early 0645 flight landing at 0900, we were on the mountains skiing by midday with ease.

Chalet Mur

We were picked up by Ben and whisked back to the beautiful Chalet Mur, which is named after the river that runs through the region. The Chalet is run Ben and Clare and is located in a village called Stranach just outside St Michael Im Lungau. After Clare twisted our arm into an early lunchtime Gluevine, we headed up to one of the smaller resorts of Sperieck and Grossarl for an afternoon ski. It was snowing all the way from the airport and wasn’t disappointing on the hill, even though the wind was up it made for an afternoon of relaxed skiing.

chalet mur lungau austria
Chalet Mur is run Ben and Clare and is located in a village called Stranach just outside St Michael Im Lungau.

On Friday, with the sun making a blinding appearance, Ben whisked us off to Fanningberg or “Funningberg”, as the locals know it. This area on the piste map seems quite small with only 5 lifts but don’t let that phase you at all. There are plenty of runs for all abilities with the main talking point being all the fun that can be had in and around the trees. Fanningberg offers safe off piste as the ski patrols do cover the marked off pistes routes as well as on. I had some of the best tree run skiing at this resort with my girlfriend enjoying the wide groomed pistes to practice her carving. We would definitely head back again. The resort also offers sledging so to finish the day, we grabbed the last lift up, knocked back a couple of Frucht Schnapps and headed down the main slope back to the bottom.

Saturday came and promised to be another good-looking day so we hopped on the free ski bus, which stops just outside the Chalet, for the 5-minute ride up to Katschberg & Aineck. “Katschi” offered some of the best red runs that we have ever skied on and true to the Austria that I know it was like millionaires ski slope. Unfortunately for us, the winds picked up in the afternoon closing Aineck, which has the longest run in Austria at 7.2km. That evening, the snow came in and started to get our hopes up for our last day.

Our final day came way to quick as always but Ben had mentioned about skiing Obertauern. It is the biggest, highest and probably most well known resort in the Lungau region. The village itself sits at 1630m with the highest lift taking you up to 2313m. The resort is all in a bowl, very easy to navigate around and offers a little something for all types of skiers. We were lucky, as the snow had continued overnight

fun sledging
Fun sledging too!

At the end of every day when we walked in Clare had prepared a rather tasty cake with plenty of tea and coffee. After a shower and a relax it was time for an evening meal and to say Clare was a cracking cook would be a major understatement. Each meal we had was a delicious home cooked hearty dinner. There was plenty (and I mean plenty) to go around and every need was catered for, even our fondness for a large glass of wine.

There are several different resorts around the region and each seems to offer something a little different. We would thoroughly recommend Ben and Clare at the Chalet Mur, as thanks to them, our holiday was even more perfect!

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