Hochschwab
To experience the last potentially warm days of this year from their best side, we've been two days hiking in the Hochschwab - region. "Potentially" because of the fact, that Vienna was, typically for this time of the year and, like the most other places in the austrian lowlands, for days and days covered in fog with temperatures around +7°C , whereas above that layer of fog, the world completely changed. Something between 15 and 20°C and shunshine from the beginning to the end of the day.
There are several reasons why i like this mountain, it's: quite high (top @ 2277 masl), quite close to Vienna (something like 2:15 hrs), not that hard to get up there (even though there are passages where you can fall quite far) and - the possibility to click capricorns and chamoises!
So far so good, here now some pictures from three different hiking - sessions in autumn.
Let's start directly with our main actors - the guys below are capricorns. An what's so nice about them, they are not frightened of humans and therefore easy to click.
The following guy has been the inpersonification of the word "chillaxed"
When you see them sitting serenely next to the path, you shouldn't forget, that they can use their horns for other things than scratching the ass ;-)
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Chamoises are a bit more careful, but if you avoid fast movements, it's also possible to get a closer shot.
Colors!!
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The upper part of Hochschwab is above the timberline and affected by the weathering of limestone, for example also lots of dolinas can be found there. The mountain hut (Schiestlhaus) on the right picture is close to the top and very interesting. It's a passive-house, uses rainwater for watersupply and solar panels for electricity, and seems to have technical goodies in each corner. Besides, the music they play there is quite cool and not that stereotype mountain-hut-stuff.
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Did I tell you already that the weather was really great? Besides, we also have a new record for late swimming (at not completely crazy conditions..) this year :-) But honestly, expressed in an alternative temperature unit, it was 2 cm cold, and charley horse came galopping around after seconds.
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The end of todays entry is dedicated to Mr. Fox (and one of his deceased fellows), a welcome and well known neighbour of the Häuslalm mountain - hut.
PS: A littlebit out of context - one of the greatest albums I've ever heard:
Anouar Brahem - Le Voyage de Sahar
Take some time, relax and listen to it!
Old stuff
A quick & dirty update, 
here the working links to some older pics from excursions in the last years. Motto: quantity 4tw!
Kärnten
Recently I joined some Orthopteromaniacs, which have - successfully - tried to fill gaps in the distribution maps of grasshopers in Austria. While they were crawling through all kind of meadows looking for grasshoppers, i did the same in the surroundings, but more focussed on reptiles. Even though the weather was quite crappy, we managed to find some of the typical species in this region, like Z. vivipara, V. berus and V. ammodytes. And for the first time in my life i accidentely stepped on a common adder because i overlooked it. A littlebit to my surprise it just tried to crawl away and didn't even make a hissing noise or an attempt to bite. Latter would have also been no problem because i had hiking shoes. Also the snake was not harmed, the underground was of this very soft alpine meadow type.
The above mentioned weatherconditions, which can be seen on the last picture, even made me to switch from clicking reptiles to enjoying flowers. Besides - it made some mushrooms grow like hell, i think i never saw this huge porcini mushrooms (Steinpilze). Bids for the coordinates (gps on camera is a really nice gimmick!) can be placed in the comments / via mail ;-)
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