Adventure Travel : Trekking in Austria Can Be a Year-Round High

We are trekking along the Zirbenweg, a mountain trail that begins at the top of the cable-car lift on the Patscherkofel crest and winds through the Alpine heights above this two-time Winter Olympics city.

We have brought our skis to this summit trail before, and in the Tirolean summer we’ve come here with our hiking boots. Around Innsbruck are many opportunities for guided and self-guided mountain treks.

After hosting the Winter Olympics in 1964 and 1976, Innsbruck began capitalizing on the fame of its ski slopes by featuring mountain hiking and climbing from spring to October.

We were drawn to trails such as the Zirbenweg nearly a decade ago. Now there are also such adventures as the “Fixed Rope Climb” and the “Romantic Refuge” knapsack climb.

Spectacular Vistas

A four-hour Zirbenweg hike over rolling crests should help condition hikers for other walks.

The spectacular vistas from this trail are difficult to beat. Mountain ridges take on the constantly changing illusions of human shapes. White clouds drift lazily by.

Part of the trail is through stone pines that have been sculpted by wind, rain and snow.

The fixed rope climb is with a guide. It begins with a funicular ride up Hungeford Mountain, then a cable car to the Seegrube station, where mountaineering equipment is issued.

A fixed rope at hand-grip level makes possible an almost vertical ascent of 2,862 feet during a five-hour round trip up and down the steep, narrow path.

Swaying Bridge

Part of the trail is over a chasm on a steel-wire bridge that sways in the wind. One of the most dramatic views is down the sheer north wall.

The panorama sweeps across the crests to the Grossglockner and Zugspitze (the highest mountains in Austria and Germany, respectively), both towering more 10,000 feet.

The cost for this climb with a guide in a party of five is 700 Austrian schillings (about $54 U.S.).

“Romantic Refuge” is a three-hour hike with knapsack featuring a 900-meter vertical ascent from this city through a forest up to a farmhouse at the edge of an Alpine meadow. There you dine and sleep. The cost of this climb is about $65.

You can vary hiking and climbing around Innsbruck with kayaking on the Inn River or summer skiing on the Stubai glacier.

Buses pick you up at the Congress Hall in the city for short rides to starting points. A training center teaches mountaineering techniques.

14-Day Adventure

“Footloose in Austria” is a 14-day adventure arranged by Mountain Travel that combines lodges and walking tours of towns and villages with mountain hikes such as the trail up to 8,362-foot Kogelsee.

Along this trek is Eisrieswelt (“the World of Ice Giants”), the largest ice caves in Europe, a 26-mile labyrinth of sculpted frozen waterfalls. The hiking trails of this trip are classified as easy to moderate.

The cost, excluding transportation between home and Munich, is $2,330 in a group of 5 to 10 members, or $2,040 in a group of 11 to 14. The cost includes guides, road and rail transportation, all accommodations and breakfasts and one dinner.

Innsbruck, a city of about 125,000, has had its own university for 300 years. Nightly entertainment includes the theater, symphony and Tirolean songs and dances. Shops offer embroidery, leather work, carvings and other handicrafts.

Folk Art Museum

The Museum of Tyrolean Folk Art is one of Europe’s most important museums. Maximilian I ordered the Goldenes Dachl built with gold-plated tiles in the year 1500 as a royal box for watching spectacles in the central square. In the Hofburg Palace, Empress Maria Theresa had 16 children and presided over a magnificent rococo dining room.

Dining facilities offer a wide choice of Austrian dishes. We relaxed after a day of mountaineering with a leisurely Tirolean dinner in the Jagerstube of the Schwarzer Adler. Each of the Adler’s 25 rooms reflects a heritage of more than four centuries; doubles begin at about $70. Small pensions in the area start at about $40.

For more information about Innsbruck and its mountaineering trails, as well as Austria’s many other Alpine adventures, contact the Austrian National Tourist Office, 11601 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 2480, Los Angeles 90025, (213) 477-3332.

Contact Mountain Travel at 1398 Solano Ave., Albany, Calif. 94706, (415) 527-8100.

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Here’s what some other adventure-travel companies are offering this year:

Sobek Expeditions lists more than 200 rafting, kayaking, canoeing, sailing, diving and land-trek adventures from the white water below Victoria Falls in Zambezi to Tiger’s Leap Gorge of the Yangtze River in China. For detailed itineraries, write to Box 1089, Angels Camp, Calif. 95222, or phone (209) 736-4524.

Equitour has horseback adventures including six days of riding out of Reykjavik, Iceland, the Killarney Trail in Ireland, the Andalusia coast of Spain, the mystical Berber villages of Morocco, a safari endurance ride in Nairobi, the Snowy Mountains of Australia and a horseback trip on the track of Genghis Khan through Outer Mongolia. Get details from Equitour, Bitterroot Ranch, Route 66, Box 1042, Dubois, Wyo. 82513, toll-free (800) 545-0019.

The Sierra Club has wilderness adventures in Madagascar, the Annapurna-Chitwan Trek in Nepal, the “Lost Horizon” Hunza Valley in Pakistan, the Dragon Kingdom Trek on the Himalayan border of Bhutan, bike trips through Ireland and Italy, hut-hopping in the Rondane Mountains of Norway, backpacking in New Zealand and a Brazilian jungle and wildlife adventure. Contact the Sierra Club, 730 Polk St., San Francisco 94109, (415) 776-2211.

Walking Trips

The Canadian company of Butterfield & Robinson features nine-day walking trips along country roads, footpaths and forest trails of France, England, Italy and Switzerland. Write to 70 Bond St., Toronto, Ont., Canada M5B 1X3, (800) 387-1147.

Among its African safaris from Algeria and Botswana to Zambia and Zimbabwe, Hemphill Harris Travel Corp. arranges such game-viewing adventures as hot-air ballooning over the Masai Mara game preserve in East Africa or tracking gorillas for seven or nine days in Rwanda. For the 72-page Africa color catalogue, contact your travel agent or Hemphill Harris Travel Corp., 16000 Ventura Blvd., Suite 200, Encino, Calif. 91436, (800) 252-2103.

Abercrombie & Kent, which has been handling African safaris for three decades, has added “Tanzania Under Canvas.” Another tour lets you explore the Galapagos Islands, where you can mingle with sea lions, iguanas, seals, tortoises and dozens of species of birds. For information on the company’s adventure expeditions, contact Abercrombie & Kent, 1420 Kensington Road, Oak Brook, Ill. 60521, (800) 323-7308.

Overseas Adventure Travel has added six destinations, among them the islands of Papua New Guinea, where you trek through valleys and villages for three days and travel by dugout canoe for five days, with the option of learning about the fertility dances in the Trobriand “islands of love.” Write for more information to 349 Broadway, Cambridge, Mass. 02139, (800) 221-0533.