Mountain biking in Carinthia

Carinthia is Austria's sunny south – and for mountain bikers it means one thing above all: the home of the Flow Country Trail. While the alpine north shows off blocky rock, the south is built for long, cleanly shaped flow trails set between the Karawanken, the Nockberge and turquoise swimming lakes. The climate is mild, the berms roll soft, and after the last descent you dive straight into the Weissensee or the Millstätter See. If you want to pair gravity with a proper summer holiday, this is the place.

The flagship sits on the Petzen right on the Slovenian border. The Petzen Flow Trail was one of the first and longest flow country trails anywhere and was named the world's best flow trail by the IMBA in 2014 – kilometres of sweeping berms from summit to valley, run by the MTB ZONE Bikepark Petzen. Over on the Italian border, Bikepark Nassfeld serves eight singletrails plus a flow line several kilometres long, and above the Kaiserburg the Flow Country Trail Bad Kleinkirchheim drops for around 15 kilometres – today the longest flow country trail in Europe.

Add the family-friendly Bikepark Weissensee with its three nature trails off the Naggler Alm, and – for clean technique – the Skillcenter Obermillstatt above the Millstätter See. Carinthia is less the land of brutal rocky downhills and more the land of long, pleasurable flow descents. Who is it for? Beginners, families and flow junkies who would rather surf into the valley grinning than fight for every metre – and who plan the swim in the lake right alongside the ride. If you want hard, rocky downhill, you'll be better served in Tyrol or Styria.