Detour #104: Grosser Oscheniksee, Austria
Grosser Oscheniksee
This little-known Austrian road is likened by locals to a cable car – as it goes straight up a mountain. The route rises 5,000ft… in just seven miles.
It’s one of the ultimate European driving detours. You start in a quiet country road from Flattach to Fragant, through the skiing area of Innerfragant, in Austria’s mountainous Carinthia region.
Turn right onto a narrow tarmac lane and suddenly everything changes. It rises like an elevator through a pine forest into the mountains. In just 12,000 yards (11,000m) you gain 4,688ft (1,429m). That translates to an average gradient of almost 12 per cent. The steepest bits are more like 20 per cent.
Apart from that, it’s stupidly narrow, has few safety barriers and includes 40 hairpin bends. And don’t even think about it between September and June when it’s usually impassable because of snow. You really don’t want ice on a road this steep and twisty.
The detour doesn’t take long though. After a few minutes you emerge from the tree-line into an unforgiving desolate rocky mountain environment, like someone arriving on the moon after a very short flight. You may feel a bit breathless.
At the top of the track you can drive onto the Oscheniksee reservoir dam which stands at 7,854ft/2,394m above sea level. Outrageous 360-degree views are a distraction from the thought of the brake-burning descent to follow.
It’s a detour that allows you to tackle one of the most severely ascending roads in the Alps - but don’t expect praise. You just pressed a pedal and turned a wheel. The ones who deserve glory are those who regularly attempt the climb, not sitting on a motorbike or in a car driver’s seat… but on cycles. Amazingly this road is a popular challenge among the very fittest cyclists.