The Schneeberg, with its 2076m-high summit Klosterwappen, is the highest mountain of Lower Austria, and the eastern-most two-thousand-metre-high mountain in the Alps. It is a distinctive limestone massif with steep slopes on three sides.

The Schneeberg is one of the calcareous Alps in the borderland between Lower Austria and Styria, in the eastern part of Austria. It and the Rax (2007 m), some 13 km to the south-west, are collectively considered the Viennese Hausberge (local mountains). The rich Karst plateaux have provided drinking water for Vienna, via a 120km-long pipeline, since 1873, claiming to be the best drinking water in the world.

On clear days, Schneeberg can be readily seen from parts of Vienna, some 65 km away (as the crow flies), together with its snow-fields that reach down its northern slopes even in summer and provide a challenge to skiers.

A rack-and-pinion railway, now over 100 years old, climbs to a height of 1800 m, reducing the walk to the summit to an hour or two. There are also a number of other routes for walkers, including from the spa resort of Puchberg am Schneeberg to the east, or from the south, in Höllental .

The summit plateau has a number of mountain huts which are visited by thousands of walkers, climbers and even mountain-bikers annually.

External links

(in German)

• http://www.wien.gv.at/ma31/wasweg7.htm
• Webcams of Losenheim and Puchberg
• Bergsteigen.at with information about climbing routes and huts in the Schneeberg/Rax area