Air

Flying time from New York to Vienna is eight hours; it's nine hours from Washington, D.C., and two hours from London.

Austria’s major air gateway is Vienna’s Schwechat Airport, on the southeast outskirts of the city. Salzburg Airport is Austria’s second-largest airport, just west of the center. Just south of Graz, in Thalerhof, is the Graz Airport. Two other airports you might consider, depending on where in Austria you intend to travel, are Bratislava’s M. R. Stefanik International airport in neighboring Slovakia, and Munich Airport International in Germany, not far from Salzburg. Bratislava is about 80 km (50 miles) east of Vienna and is the hub for Ryanair, a budget carrier with low-cost connections to several European cities. Frequent buses can take you from Bratislava airport to central Vienna in about an hour. Consider Munich if your primary destination is western Austria, Salzburg, or Innsbruck.

Ground Transportation and Transfers

The City Airport Train (CAT) provides service from Schwechat to downtown Vienna for €21 round-trip (€12 one way). Tickets are available at the CAT counter in the arrivals hall; the trip takes about 15 minutes. Travel into the city on the local S-Bahn takes about 25 minutes and costs €4.20 (ticket machines are on the platforms). City bus No. 2 runs every 10 minutes between both the city center and Salzburg's main train station and the airport; transfers cost €2.40. A taxi ride from the airport will be about €20. Schwechat Airport’s website has information for all ground transfers.

Flights

Budget airlines, including Ryanair and Lauda, offer low-cost flights from major cities around Europe. These airlines are not normally recommended for connecting with transatlantic flights because of the hassle of changing airports, but they provide a low- cost way of getting around within Europe. German charter carrier Condor has flights between Vienna and Las Vegas, and Canadian charter airline Air Transat (www.airtransat.ca), offers flights from Montreal and Toronto to Vienna.

Within Austria, Austrian Airlines and its subsidiary, Tyrolean Airways, offer service from Vienna to Linz, Salzburg, Klagenfurt, and Innsbruck; they also provide routes to and from points outside Austria.