Bad Aussee

The 1827 marriage of Archduke Johann (notoriously nicknamed the "father of Styria"—at last count, he had 1,200 descendants) to Anna Plochl, the daughter of the local postmaster, brought attention and a burst of new construction, including some lovely 19th-century villas. Of special note is the little late-Gothic hospital church, with its 16th-century frescoes. In the mid-19th century musicians flocked here to relax and compose. Nikolaus Lenau worked on his version of Faust here, Mahler began his Fourth Symphony in 1899, and right after the turn of the century Hugo von Hofmannsthal wrote his famous Jedermann play as well as the beloved libretti for Richard Strauss's operas Der Rosenkavalier and Ariadne auf Naxos. You can walk along a marked "Via Artis" here and in Altaussee to see all the different locales that gave inspiration to such famed creative souls. Aussee is a good base for hiking in the surrounding countryside in summer and for excellent skiing in winter. Many travelers come to Bad Aussee via the train from Salzburg, making a connection southward at the Attnang-Puchheim junction.