Austria I think was always going to be about the scenery and it was. Vienna was nice, but at the end of the day it was just another large city, we did enjoy the architecture and history and the palace grounds were amazing, we spent a long and tiring day looking around a lot of Vienna, but then had to ride back to Bratislava to camp. So as I started, it was all about the scenery, but from the first day we arrived in Austria it rained and when we woke in the morning it had snowed on the nearby mountains. We then ducked back into Germany for a day (it was fine), then we re-entered Austria and it rained again so we stopped in a town called Werfen where we found a number of interesting places to visit. The next day it was fine so we visited Erlebnisburg Hohenwerfen, a fortress perched on a small mountain, it was brilliant and the guided tour was very well done, next though was Eisriesenwelt, the largest ice cave in the world. To get to the entrance we had to do quite a bit of walking and also caught a cable car, the entrance was at around 1600 metres and above the snow line. The trip through the cave had us negotiating another 1400 stairs and going a thousand metres into the mountain and the views from the entrance were amazing, not to mention the views inside, though unfortunately we couldn't take photos inside. The next day was fine again, so on the way to Vienna we stopped to look at an amazing gorge where they have tunneled through the walls so that we can get in to see it, the gorge was Liechtensteinklamm, or Liechtenstein Gorge in English. The gorge has been open since 1875 and you will just have to look at the photos to get an idea of what it was like. Vienna was fine and sunny and the east of Austria was quite flat and mainly farming, while the mountains are in the south and west. The day we left Vienna and headed south it was fine, but as we got into the mountains it started pouring and didn't stop! We called by a little village near Graz called Thal, (How many of you know what is there I wonder). Here we stopped and took photos of the Arnold Schwarzenegger Museum with a statue of Arnie out the front. We stayed that night in an expensive B&B, more commonly known as Zimmers, in a small village called Hischegg. The next day was fine, but our riding gear was still very wet, so when we went over a pass at 1650 metres and the temp dropped to 4°, we were freezing. The next day we paid €22 to ride a famous pass, the Glossglockner Hochalpenstrasse. Here we got to see the ninth largest glacier in Austria and the highest mountain, Glossglockner at 3798 metres. The views and the road were just incredible, we also got to see the start of a hill climb race with cars dating back to the 20s, it was brilliant. We then went over another pass, Gerlos Alpenstrasse before going past Innsbruck and back into Italy to stay in Löwenhof. The next day we headed over another well known pass, Timmelsjoch Hochalpenstrasse which took us back into Austria, and you guessed it, it started raining again, and we had to camp! The next day it was fine as we headed back into Italy to do yet another pass, this one was just out of this world, it climbed some 1200 metres in 22 Ks and topped out at around 2700 metres and on top there were bikers everywhere and the view was of ice and snow capped mountains with clouds in the valleys below, breath taking, the pass was Stelvio pass and the ride down the other side was just as brilliant. If you want to see what these passes are like, put them into Google Earth! Then it was on to Switzerland for even more passes and rain!