You would expect a regular, let alone frequent visitor to any city to have, at the very least, a cursory knowledge of its immediate surroundings. But in Europe, where capitals are often an intoxicating thespian tonic of visual seduction littered with cultural gems and gastronomic finds, getting to discover their haphazardly laid-out soul can take years, if not a lifetime.
And so it was that despite my repeated visits to Vienna, I was still ignorant as to what lay beyond its Gürtel - the outer of the city's two Otto Wagner-designed ring roads. And who could blame me: with blockbuster cultural attractions, wide leafy boulevards and coffeehouses like Café Landtmann, I was perfectly happy to while away the hours, newspapers in one hand and an espresso in the other having skipped through galleries at MQ and concerts at the Musikverein.
That is until just a few months ago, when I made my way to Lower Austria or Niederösterreich: the country's largest province, covering fully a quarter of land, it envelops the capital; hugs Austria's eastern-most corner; and stretches from the Czech border in the north to the Slovakian border, with that country's alluring capital, Bratislava, just a stone's throw away.
Apple and wine country
My visit, I'm ashamed to admit, wasn't fueled by curiosity. No, I was sent to the region to report and so it was that soon after arriving at Schwechat Airport, located south of the city, I jumped on the Ost Autobahn (A40/E60) for the short trip north, longingly skirting the fringes of the capital on a combination of the E59 (which crossed the Danube) before making my way northwest on the A22, the Donauufer Autobahn.
Lower Austria consists of four distinct regions; counter-clockwise they are the Waldviertel (forest region), Mostviertel (the must region, where tidy orchards at the foothills of the Alps produce superlative apple and pear musts), Industrieviertel (the industrial region to the south and west of the city, which includes the airport) and lastly, the Weinviertel or wine region, the country's largest.
I was headed to Langenlois, a picturesque baroque village 45 minutes from Vienna whose central location in the Weinviertel - just north of the Danube and south of the immaculate Naturpark Kamptal - made it an ideal point from which to explore the countryside. The tiny cobbled village, known to clued-up Europeans for years, was recently put on the architectural map by American designer Steven Holl's striking Loisium wine resort, which opened exactly a year ago.
The 82-room hotel, a stunning metallic play on light and space, is nestled amid newly planted vines and complements the Loisium Museum, an equally dramatic three-storey metallic structure containing centuries-old cellars, which together form the $24 million property. And while I was entirely happy to settle down in its year-round heated pool, its three saunas and its mint-green Aveda spa, I was also inquisitive enough about the surroundings to get on the road.
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