Upper Austria

Unfolding across the gently undulating countryside, this under-the-radar region has a taste of all that is great about Austria. For starters, there's the mighty Danube and a rich musical heritage, old-world coffee houses and castle-topped medieval towns, and resplendent Augustinian abbeys and spas.

Beyond the high-tech museums and avant-garde galleries of Linz lies a land in miniature filled with surprises: from rustic farmhouses serving home-grown Most (cider) to the limestone pinnacles of the Kalkalpen, where the elusive lynx roams and picturesque towns such as Steyr and Schärding are painted in a palette of ice cream–coloured hues. Whether you're among the mist-shrouded hills rippling towards the Czech Republic or wheat fields fading into a watercolour distance at dusk, you'll find these landscapes have a quiet, lingering beauty of their own.