Category: Waldschlössl-Posts

Where can I have breakfast?

Unfortunately, we cannot offer breakfast yet (until our café opens). If you’ve booked a room without its own kitchen, the following option might work well for you:
Our not-yet-opened café can be used free of charge by our guests. You’ll find a coffee machine, a kettle, a microwave, a fridge, plates, cups – everything you need for a simple, cozy breakfast.
If this sounds good to you, just let us know and we’ll gladly show you the space!

If you prefer having breakfast elsewhere, there are several nice places nearby:

• Bäckerei & Konditorei Nöbauer (1.5 km): Fresh pastries, coffee, classic Austrian breakfast.

• Parkhotel Hirschwang: • Bäckerei & Konditorei Nöbauer (1.5 km): Fresh pastries, coffee, classic Austrian breakfast.

• Park Café: Atmospheric café right by the pond, with a small outdoor playground – ideal in summer! UPDATE from 2025 November: closed

• Café Alber in Payerbach: Cozy, classic breakfast café, 5 minutes by car.

• Café Konditorei Reichenau

Which restaurants are nearby?

Within a radius of about 2 km, you’ll find several restaurants:

• Schloss Stuben

• Restaurant Payerbacherhof

• La Torre : Italian restaurant run by a Hungarian team

• Reichenauerhof (currently temporarily closed)

For special occasions, we highly recommend Looshaus am Kreuzberg: Looshaus am Kreuzberg

More restaurant tips – especially for gluten-free options – can be found in our blog post:

👉Gluten-Free Adventures – Recommendations Around Waldschlössl

Are there any pastry shops nearby?

Yes, several! Besides the cafés already mentioned in the breakfast section, one in particular deserves special attention:

• Le petit Pâtisserie

A small, exquisite patisserie in Reichenau, where the owner works with incredible care and taste. If you find it open, it’s absolutely worth a visit!

You can also find delicious pastries and coffee here:

• Bäckerei & Konditorei Nöbauer

• Café Alber 

• Park Café (from 2025 November currently closed)

• Café Konditorei Reichenau 

What are the check-in and check-out times?

• Check-in: from 3:00 pm

• Check-out: by 10:00 am at the latest

If you would like to arrive earlier or leave later, just let us know – we’re flexible whenever possible!

Is there a shared kitchen?

There isn’t a fully equipped shared kitchen, but in the not-yet-open café, there is a seating area available where you can prepare simple meals – especially breakfast – on your own.

You’ll find the following available for your use: microwave, refrigerator, freezer, electric kettle, dishes, and a coffee machine.

Can you drink the tap water?

In the Reichenau an der Rax region, tap water is perfectly safe to drink. It comes mainly from the pristine springs of the Rax and Schneeberg mountains and is considered some of the highest-quality drinking water in Austria. It tastes fresh, is strictly monitored, and flows straight from nature into your home – a real treat after a hike or anytime during the day. If you’re visiting the area, you can skip the bottled water and simply refill your bottle from the tap.

Will there be snow in winter?

We cannot predict whether there will be snow here, or how much. Waldschlössl is located at about 580 meters above sea level, so nothing can be guaranteed. In recent years, there have been times when we already had 20 cm of snow at the beginning of December, but it completely melted by Christmas. Other times, it snowed exactly at Christmas, we even went on a snowy hike on March 31. Last year, however, there was so little precipitation that the Rax could practically be climbed snow-free on January 1.

So where can you go sledding, snowshoeing, or skiing nearby?

What’s certain is that there are sledding tracks on Semmering, on Stuhleck and on St. Corona am Wechsel. These usually open on the first or second weekend of December, depending on the weather. You can also ski there, and they are only 20–35 minutes away from us by car.

On the Rax, once the first major snowfall arrives, you can go snowshoe hiking.

f enough snow falls on the Rax (which didn’t happen last year, but in all years before that), there is a natural sledding track where you can sled all winter long: We Found Winter – with Kids, a Sled, and a Backpack on the Rax.

If you have any further questions, feel free to write to us or give us a call – we’re always happy to help.

We wish you a relaxing and enjoyable stay at Waldschlössl! 🌿✨

The bushes we planted all around the garden over the past few years are finally bearing fruit – and what a harvest! 🫐

We’ve got gooseberries, Siberian honeyberries, blueberries, goji berries, raspberries, jostaberries, currants (both red and black). Strawberries are growing in one of the raised beds, and wild strawberries are peeking out from the greenery all around the garden. And now, slowly, the blackberries are starting to ripen too.

We spent the last few evenings – and a cloudy morning – picking, snacking, making jam and pressing juice.

A huge thank you to the best helpers ever: Laron and Leno – without you, our baskets would have been only half full! ❤️👩‍🌾👨‍🌾

Video here

As many of you know, we’re planning to open our café next year. Our goal is to offer our guests fresh fruits and vegetables from our own garden for as long as possible. To help extend the growing season – both in spring and fall – we’ve built a greenhouse with 45 square meters of floor space.

The greenhouse is neither insulated nor heated, but we expect that it won’t cool down as much at night compared to the outside. That’s thanks to the surrounding granite stone walls and concrete, which retain heat and release it slowly.

The frame is made of galvanized aluminum, and the roof and side walls are constructed from toughened ESG glass. It’s a solid, heavy-duty build – something we deliberately chose, as the greenhouse needs to withstand strong winds and hail. We wanted something that can handle such stress easily and last for many years.

The greenhouse has 14 roof windows and 4 side windows, all equipped with automatic, temperature-controlled openers. There are also four manually operable windows at the back wall, and of course, the doors can be left open too. That should prevent it from overheating in the peak of summer and harming the plants.

Watering is semi-automated, just like with our raised beds. A drip irrigation system is connected to our well water and needs to be switched on and off manually.

We’ll be testing the greenhouse thoroughly this year, and we’re hopeful that next spring we’ll be able to start planting delicate crops earlier than before.

Video

“Don’t you ever long for home?” – I also felt that the question sounded like a cliché. However, I was simply interested in the answer.

“I do what I love doing and it doesn’t matter where I am.” I am sure I cannot quote Eszter’s answer word-by-word, but perhaps I do not even need to be verbatim.

Eszter is a caring mother of two lovely girls; and beyond this, she is a genius of trail runners (3rd place at Western States 100-Mile Endurance Run last year), and at the weekend she became the Hungarian champion at the Vienna Marathon. She is one of those people who will always bring back memories from the times when I was twenty years old. When I was dreaming about a small, enchanting café where we could meet people… like Eszter, her mother and her friend, Kata Kertész. Three wonderful and strong women. Talking about trailrunning, motherhood, training, motivation and challenges. Talking without taboos.

Thank you for the marvellous morning!

Our beehouse has come to life again – quite literally! Not long ago, six bee colonies made the journey from Carinthia, lovingly provided by Christian’s dad. Christian and Leno brought them home in a daring night drive.

Five of those colonies are already strong and productive. The sixth one is our first breeding hive – and with space for up to 18 colonies in our beehouse, there’s plenty of room to grow.

We’re hopeful the bees will adjust to the breezier conditions here – they certainly weren’t used to this much wind back in Carinthia. Spring’s blossom season wasn’t ideal this year due to the weather, but we’ve already spotted the first tiny splashes of honey in the upper hive.

We’re optimistic that in the years to come, these bees will help pollinate our fruit trees – and who knows, maybe we’ll even get a taste of forest honey this season.

We can’t wait to see what this beekeeping year has in store – and when we’ll get to say the words we’re all waiting for: “Time to spin some honey!”