The Salzburg region is Austria with the volume turned up on variety, where a single week can hold a glacier, a lake warm enough to swim in, and a cave of permanent ice. Summer belongs to the Salzkammergut lakes, with the Wolfgangsee and Fuschlsee handing families swimming, kayaking, and lazy boat rides framed by peaks. The region's signature, though, is what hides underground and overhead: the Eisriesenwelt near Werfen is the largest ice cave on earth, the Salzwelten salt mines at Hallein let kids ride wooden slides deep into the mountain, and the Krimml Waterfalls thunder down Austria's highest cascade on a trail gentle enough for short legs. It is the rare alpine region where the weather barely matters, because half the best of it sits indoors and underground.

The city of Salzburg supplies the culture, a baroque old town wrapped around a hilltop fortress, the Mozart connection, and the Sound of Music backdrops that turn a walking tour into a singalong nobody planned. Winter swaps the lakes for Zell am See-Kaprun, Saalbach-Hinterglemm, and Obertauern, all with ski schools, gentle slopes, and sledding, plus Christmas markets and ice rinks in villages like St. Wolfgang. The Ferleiten wildlife park keeps the animal lovers happy with lynx, ibex, and bears. The hotels run from alpine resorts with kids' clubs and childcare to lakeside hotels with family suites and cozy mountain lodges, so a family can chase snow, water, or city culture and still land somewhere that does the looking-after for them.