The Gasteiner Wasserfall and the Wasserfallbrücke

Nowhere else in Austria does a river of this size fall through a town centre. The Gasteiner Ache arrives from the Naßfeld and the Anlauftal, cuts into the rock at the top of Bad Gastein and drops roughly 340 metres in three stages before continuing down the valley. The town was built around the noise: hotels, the Kongresshaus and the old bath houses stand on the ledges either side of the gorge.

The Wasserfallbrücke, the stone bridge of 1840 that was widened in 1927, crosses at the middle fall and is the frame everybody takes — the water breaking under you, the Badeschloss on one side and the wooded gorge below. Two paths, the Wasserfallweg, follow the water down past all three steps with several railed platforms on the way, and each gives a different combination of spray, rock and roofs.

Light in a gorge this narrow is a question of hours, not of golden light: the sun reaches the water only in the middle of the day, and the best pictures are usually made in bright overcast or in the hour before the sun leaves, when the far wall stays lit and the fall itself sits in shade.

One honest caveat: the flow has been lower since a small power station was built at Böckstein in 1980, so the fall is at its most impressive with snowmelt in May and June and after heavy rain. In winter the whole gorge ices up in curtains and the platforms can be slippery or closed — check the state of the path before planning a session on it.