First Bike Trips With New Bikes
To test our brand-new bikes, we went to Verena’s home village Sankt Peter in der Au and did some bike trips around there. Situated in the heart of the charming Mostviertel in Lower Austria, St. Peter offers good terrain for bike tours with its gentle pre-alpine landscape.
We cycled to the neighbouring villages Seitenstetten, up to Sankt Michael am Bruckbach, around Ertl, to the nearest town called Steyr with its delightful historical downtown and back as well as up to Kürnberg to the Elisabethwarte. After these day trips we also wanted to test our camping skills and went to the famous pilgrimage destination Mariazell via the one and only natural lake in Lower Austria, magnificent Lunzer See.
To finalise the bike training boot camp, we went from St. Peter to Ybbs an der Donau to catch the train from there back to Vienna.
THE STATS & LINKS TO TOURS
trips around St. Peter
The first three tours were around St. Peter. The neighbouring village of St. Peter is Seitenstetten, where you can find the pioneers of the potato of the country. In 1621, the first potato was planted there.
A generous thing to happen in Austria is to offer some delicacies of the abundant harvest of fruit to strangers passing by. So it happened to us that we bumped into these fruity peaches waiting to be picked from a lonely bench, seducing us to indulge in a healthy snack on the way and take a break (disclaimer: gifts don’t go without manipulation. The host’s political orientation can be deducted from the sponsored notepad).
The distinctive natural features of the Mostviertel are its cider apple and cider pear trees framing its roads and gentle hilly landscape.
Eating lunch with a view is probably one of the biggest rewards of doing outdoor sports of whatever kind.
On a two-day-tour we went from St. Peter to Mariazell via Lunzer See. One of the most picturesque towns around St. Peter is definitely Waidhofen an der Ybbs, which we passed by on our way. Going for a coffee in its historic city center is a must and the Ybbstalfahrradweg (bike lane) leads all the way to the Lunzer See inviting you to take a dip in hot summer or just slender around.
From St. Peter in der Au
to Mariazell
After we arrived quite late in the evening at our destination on day 1, we camped on a nice camping site and enjoyed a morning coffee by the lake the next day.
On day 2, we were surprised by the gorgeous Erlaufsee, one of Austria’s numerous mountain lakes with turquoise-blue fresh water.
When we finally reached our destination for this two-day-trip, Verena’s parents, uncle and aunt were already waiting for us to pick us up by car. We enjoyed a well-deserved traditional Austrian lunch and bought some of the famous Pirker Lebkuchen (gingerbread) and went home to St. Peter filled with joy and excitement for other bike adventures.