Die wilden Steiner Alpen – Am südlichsten Punkt Österreichs

This new production explores little-known terrain in a fairytale-like, fascinating landscape: The Vellacher Kotschna is a high valley in the Kamnik-Savinja Alps and forms the southernmost tip of Carinthia as well as Austria in the border region with Slovenia. It lies on the municipal area of Eisenkappel-Vellach and has been a nature reserve since 1959. People here also speak of the so-called "Stone Curtain" – a phrase of days long past, when here was literally the closure, not only because of the 2200 m high rock face.

The cultural diversity of the small-structured businesses has meanwhile not only left behind the borders that always had to be tediously overcome here, but has also contributed to the enrichment of an entire region. What has remained, however, is the unique geology of the easternmost foothills of the Southern Alps, the Kamnik-Savinija Alps with their steep, narrow passes, which were once used as smugglers' routes for this reason as well.

With dense, high forests that merge seamlessly into rugged, sometimes bizarre rocky landscapes that are both appreciated and feared by many alpinists, as protagonists of this issue vividly recount, including Zdravko Haderlap, who organizes an annual cultural-historical hike across abandoned mountain farms, following the principle: "We need stories. We need them to understand ourselves." (Senderinfo)