2025 - July - Semmering

Please give me a cliché: mountain panorama with blue sky, green grass, and of course cows in the foreground. Sure, just take a trip to Semmering.

And that's exactly what we did. From Vienna, you can actually take a day trip to the mountains. (However, we did get up at 6 AM for this.)

A train departs hourly from Vienna Central Station in that direction. Ours was the EuroCity to Trieste, leaving at 07:58 AM. You can tell that the train takes many hours to reach the Adriatic by the fact that it even stops in Semmering. That's fine with us, of course.

With a forecast of 30 degrees in Vienna, we needed a bit of summer freshness. You can usually find that at this altitude. Semmering itself is at 950 meters, and the cable car we aimed for takes you even higher, to 1,340 meters above sea level.

After a not inexpensive ride on the cable car (29 euros per person for a round trip), you can enjoy the view at the Liechtenstein House. You do need to be a bit careful here, as mountain bikers constantly race down the paths. They also take the cable car up. However, they don't need a return ticket. There are different routes down, ranging from easy to challenging. There are also so-called fun racers, a type of all-terrain tricycle, which have their own track. As hikers, we initially felt a bit overwhelmed trying to find the right way.

In winter, everything here is geared towards skiing, but in summer, the area needs another source of income, and apparently, hikers alone are not quite enough.

Our goal was to walk from the mountain station at the Liechtenstein House to Sonnwendstein with the Pollerer Hut.

After a short search, we found our way. First, we went a bit downhill along the fun racer track, then several kilometers steadily uphill. I would say the path to the Pollerer Hut was about 3.6 kilometers long. Not particularly far, but noticeable due to the incline.

You also need to factor in the walk from the train station to the mountain pass or the valley station of the cable car. That part involves about 25 minutes of uphill walk first. Coming back is of course more relaxing. Allegedly, there is a call bus, but we didn't see it.

Either way, the journey is the destination, or perhaps it's really the mountain hut. Both the Pollerer Hut and the Liechtenstein House offer delicious dishes and cool drinks. Neither the path nor any of the huts were overcrowded, even on a Saturday with great weather.

So, for anyone looking for a little break from the city's hustle and bustle, Semmering provides exactly that: views, fresh air, tranquility – and yes, also cows.