Riding on from Imst, the names on the signposts look like a winter holidays brochure: Zillertal, Mayrhofen. Suddenly the route changes from seemingly endless villages, each with its own speed camera, to a more challenging route up from the valley floor. Massive civil engineering brings the route up in altitude to twisted pine trees and views of snowy mountains and glaciers. At last - on this trip - the pretty Austria that I came to ride. A halt at a view of the Durlassboden reservoir and a short chat with two guys on a road trip out from the Netherlands.
Riding on from Imst, the names on the signposts look like a winter holidays brochure: Zillertal, Mayrhofen. Suddenly the route changes from seemingly endless villages, each with its own speed camera, to a more challenging route up from the valley floor.
Massive civil engineering brings the route up in altitude to twisted pine trees and views of snowy mountains and glaciers. At last - on this trip - the pretty Austria that I came to ride. A halt at a view of the Durlassboden reservoir and a short chat with two guys on a road trip out from the Netherlands.
There are tolls to pay on these high mountain roads but after the white mountain views at the Gerlos Pass (1500 m.) and plateau, the Gerlos Alpenstraße road reveals the white of the spectacular Krimml waterfalls. Glacier melt water tumbles in abundance down nearly 400 m. in a a series of leaps, spray jetting off and accentuated by the sunlight: like so many waterfalls and to the continuing frustration of photographers everywhere, the Krimml Falls face north, away from the sun. I met with the rider of diesel motorbike, a Royal Enfield Bullet. A real engineering curiosity!
On down the valley of the river Sazach to Zell am See. And suddenly the car plates go from being Austria and Germany to being Hungary, Slovenia and a few more Polish than elsewhere.
A turning, the car traffic thins and now the motorbikes are 50% of the traffic and riding hard with it. At last, after many years of anticipation, not to mention a lost summer in hospital in a wheelchair, I'm on the approach to the Großglockner Hochalpenstraße. Only the one photo stop, at Fuscher Törl (2431 m.), I just ride the road, enjoying this route that is the high alpine route above all others. And I wasn’t disappointed with long sweeping stretches, stacks of hairpins and an overall gradient that is challengingly steep. Arriving at the pretty village of Heligenblut (1288 m.) and I found the friendly hotel I had booked. The sunset was magnificent, that’s not the Hillary Step up there but the tetrahedral Großglockner peak (3798 m.) still looks spectacular in the fiery sunset.