More information - Bad Gastein - Austria

An international resort of town-sized dimensions, Bad Gastein in the Hohe Tauern mountains has a long history of tourism pre-dating winter sports by many centuries. Today it is a town of grand appearance with classically designed hotels with shades of white and pale yellow cutting up in to the skyline. The town grew up, as its name might suggest, on 17 natural healing thermal springs which still rise directly beneath it as they have for the past 3000 years. After a hard day skiing the 250km (170 miles) of trails on the Gastein Valley Pass it's possible to bathe in the open air in the rock swimming pool complex filled by the hot natural springs. Bad Gastein's spa treatments were recognised as far back as the 13th century, but its skiing potential only came to light in the 1950s after the first cable car in Austria was opened here in 1950 and the Ski World Cup of 1958 subsequently drew further attention. However the resort remains as famous for its curative abilities as it does for its winter sports facilities, with the healing powers of the Gastein Thermal Gallery particularly highly praised. This was created by miners digging for gold who discovered that, despite the hard work, their rheumatic pains were getting less, not greater. The sense of the importance of water to Bad Gastein - be it bubbling up through the rocks below or turned to snow on the mountains above, is everywhere, and emphasised most visibly perhaps by the spectacular waterfall that cascades down by the town.