Asparn an der Zaya is the kind of Weinviertel village you could ride through in forty seconds and never suspect it holds one of Austria's best windows onto the deep past. The old castle in the middle of the village houses MAMUZ, the museum of prehistory for Lower Austria, and behind it an open-air area of reconstructed houses from the Stone Age to the Iron Age. If you have ever wondered who lived on these loess hills before the vineyards, this is where to find out.
The landscape is quietly beautiful rather than dramatic. The Zaya is a small river winding east through a wide, gentle valley, and around it the Weinviertel rolls away in long waves of vines, sunflowers and wheat. Cellar lanes, the Kellergassen, cut into the hillsides on the edge of many villages: rows of little pressing houses with doors set into the loess, where wine was made and stored for centuries. On a warm evening the light goes golden over the fields and the whole region seems to slow down.
For riding, think open, flowing back roads rather than hairpins. The lanes between Mistelbach, Asparn and the villages north towards the Czech border are lightly trafficked, mostly decent tarmac, with crests and long bends that let you settle into a rhythm. Watch for farm machinery in harvest season and for gravel carried onto corners from field tracks. Wind can be a factor here; this is open country with little shelter.
As a start and finish, it works well. Mistelbach is only a few minutes away and is the local market town, with fuel, shops and places to eat. Vienna is roughly an hour south, which makes Asparn a calm place to begin or end a longer day towards the Alps, away from the city's traffic. If the museum is open when you pass, give it an hour; otherwise a slow lap of the village and a look at the castle walls is a fine way to bookend the ride.