Trekking in Austria’s Zillertal Alps: The Zillertal Rucksack Route, South Tyrol Tour, Peter Habeler and Olperer Runde

Guide to three short hut-to-hut treks in the Zillertal region of the Austrian Tyrol: the 9-day Zillertal Rucksack Route/Berliner Hohenweg, the 7-day Zillertal South Tyrol Tour and the 5-day Olperer Rundweg. With optional excursions to climb neighbouring peaks, some of which call for mountaineering skills and glacier crossings.

An engineer by profession, Allan Hartley spent the majority of his working life overseas engaged on major construction projects. Throughout this time, however, he maintained his close links with Austria, which he discovered totally by accident in the early 1970s while trying to avoid atrocious weather conditions in the higher mountains of the western Alps. He believes that Austria and the Dolomites of neighbouring Italy remain one of mountaineering’s best-kept secrets, with their heady mix of superb scenery, good huts and first-class food, and that they are areas better suited to the average mountaineer than the higher mountains to the west.