Geography and climate
Austria is a federal republic located in Central Europe and bordering countries such as the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Slovenia, Italy, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Germany. The area of the country is 83,859 km². See Austria abbreviations.
Austria consists of 9 lands that have their own parliaments, constitutions and governments: Burgenland, the city of Vienna, Upper Austria, Salzburg, Carinthia, Lower Austria, Vorarlberg, Styria and Tyrol.
In the capital of each of the above lands there is an airport. The largest cities in Austria are Vienna, Graz, Linz, Innsbruck and Salzburg.
Austria is a country of contrasting relief: from deep lowlands to mountain peaks. Most of Austria is made up of mountains.
The average height of the mountain ranges here reaches 900 meters, while the main part of the country is occupied by the Eastern Alps, which include: the Salzburg Alps (in the northern part), the North Tyrol Alps, as well as the Zillertal and Karnik Alps (in the southern part of the massif). The highest mountain here is Grossglockner, its height is 3797 meters. Here is the largest glacier in Europe – Pasteursee (its length is 10 kilometers, and its area is 32 square kilometers).
The main Alpine features include the fact that these mountains cross wide, long valleys, and the passes here are quite comfortable for travel, and therefore moving to different parts of the country is not at all difficult. Through many passes in Austria there are even railway tracks.
Austria is a country with a heterogeneous climate, which is primarily due to its mountainous terrain. The eastern flat part of the country is located in the zone of temperate continental climate, and in the mountains the climate is more severe: hot and short summer periods give way to cold winter months (snow cover in the high part of the Alps lies for most of the year).
In the area of the city of Vienna, the average air temperature in July is about +19 °C, and in January 0 °C. The average annual air temperature in Austria is +10 °С. The snow line is located at the level of 2500-2800 meters. With every 100 meters of ascent, the air temperature decreases by 0.5 °C.
Famous beach and medical resorts in Austria: Baden, Bad Ischl.
Famous ski resorts in Austria: Otztal, Mayrhofen, Kitzbühel, Ischgl, Serfaus, Kaprun.
Austrian cuisine
Saying “Austrian cuisine”, most often they mean Viennese cuisine. Austrian non-Austrian dishes are most often considered a provincial speciality.
Historically, Viennese cuisine has evolved under the influence of the culinary traditions of different peoples, moreover, it was the peoples, and not the aristocracy, in connection with which even the most famous dishes of Viennese cuisine are distinguished by their “low” origin and democratic prices. In addition, Viennese cuisine is the only national cuisine in the world named after a city and not a state.
A typical Austrian lunch includes three courses: a small portion of soup (usually beef broth with the addition of dumplings or thinly shredded pancakes, dumplings or vermicelli serves as a soup), the main course is usually meat with vegetables, roots. In Austria, they love and know how to cook both poultry and beef and pork in many ways.
According to 800zipcodes, Austrian specialties such as Wiener schnitzel, grilled pork knuckle (steelze), breaded chicken deep-fried, served with potato salad (backhendl), pork rinds (grammelschmalz), deep- fried fatty pork with caraway seeds (“kummelbraten”), smoked brisket with horseradish (“selchfleisch”), tender boiled beef ham (“tafelspitz”) usually served with apple horseradish, onion sauce and garnish in the form of fried potatoes.
The third course in a traditional dinner is, of course, dessert (as for desserts and Viennese pastries, they are deservedly famous all over the world). The most popular Austrian desserts are apple strudel, strudel with cottage cheese (“topfenstrudel”), the Kaiserschmarren dessert made from pancake dough with plum compote, as well as “povidltascherl” – potato dough pies with plum filling.
Austria is a country where winemaking has flourished since ancient times, there are many cozy establishments called heuriger (or bushenschank) selling wines of their own production. They also serve fermented grape juice, white wine with sparkling water, wines made from different grape varieties, as well as wines from the last harvest. The most popular among lovers of young Austrian wines are the areas where a large number of such establishments are concentrated: Grinzing, Sivering and Nussdorf, Strebersdorf and Stammesdorf, Gumpoldskirchen and Perholtsdorf.
Austrian beer is less well known around the world than beer produced nearby in Bavaria. However, many of the beers produced in Austria are not exported to other countries and are highly prized by the locals. In total, there are over 350 varieties of beer here. Austrians traditionally dilute beer with lemonade. This specific drink is called a radler.
