Radstadt is a little walled town in the Enns valley, on the border of Salzburg and Styria, and it is one of the few places in Austria where the medieval town walls are still standing in good order. Towers, a moat and long stretches of wall from the thirteenth century enclose a rectangle of narrow streets with painted houses, a parish church and a market square, and the gates are still the way in. The town held out against a siege of rebellious peasants during the uprising of 1525 and 1526, when the countryside around the Salzburg lands rose against its prince-archbishop, which is the proudest story of the place.
The mountains around are the other half of the character. To the south, the road climbs toward Obertauern, a ski resort at the top of the Radstädter Tauern pass, which carries the old road over the Alps toward Carinthia. Obertauern is known for reliable snow and, to film fans, for the scenes shot there in 1965 for the Beatles film Help!, which brought a touch of the sixties to the pass. In summer the village is quiet, with cowbells and the smell of cut hay.
For riders, the Tauern road is the highlight. It leaves the Enns valley and climbs in a series of wide bends and several hairpins through spruce forest to the pass, at about seventeen hundred and forty metres, then drops into the Lungau, with a smooth surface and a steady gradient that makes it a favourite among motorcyclists. Weekends see plenty of bikes, so there can be congestion on the climb, and the pass can have snow from late autumn to spring. Fog and sudden showers are common, so carry a rain layer.
Radstadt has a handful of fuel stations on the road through the valley, plus supermarkets and bakeries, and it is a sensible place to fill up before heading over the Tauern. The nearest larger town is Bischofshofen, nineteen kilometres away. Local cafes serve coffee and cake, and in the small restaurants you can try Pinzgau-style dishes with cheese and dumplings. The best months are June to September.