Family hiking: which trails actually work with children

The summer holidays are coming, and with them the big question: where do we go hiking with the children? The answer is rarely the famous family classic all your friends rave about. It is a trail that fits your pace, your weather and your form on the day.

The Austrian Alpine Club puts the guiding idea like this: we accompany our children into the mountains, not the other way round. Child-friendly therefore does not mean „short", it means interesting. The club explicitly advises planning mountain days with children playfully and building in plenty of breaks. A lake, an alpine pasture with animals, a playground at the end: all better than a long monotonous forestry road with no high point.

The rule that matters most: the tour is set by the weakest person. Children do not simply walk the route. They take detours, stop to look at things, hop from stone to stone. Plan for that rather than experiencing it as a delay.

A widely used orientation for distance is the simple formula age × 1.5, in kilometres on largely flat ground. A six-year-old can therefore manage around nine kilometres, provided the path is not too demanding.

But the kilometre count is not everything. Altitude gain, the state of the path and breaks matter far more. Going up and down costs children a great deal more than flat ground of the same length. Three kilometres with 400 metres of climbing are often harder work than eight kilometres along a lake.

If you are unsure, check the route with our outdoor weather tool and look at the heat and rain risk. When it is too warm, take the shorter variant and start early.

The Austrian Alpine Club tiers its recommendations by age group, because each one has its own needs. Take that into account and you plan more calmly, and spare yourself the classic realisation that you should have stayed in the valley.

The trails below are tried and tested examples from the Austrian Alps. They do not replace your own research, but they give you a direction to search in.

Pack a little more rather than too little, and spread the weight across everyone's shoulders. For children's packs the Austrian Alpine Club names concrete ceilings: ages 3 to 5 no more than 1 kg, 6 to 8 no more than 3 kg, 9 to 12 no more than 5 kg. As a rough cross-check, stay under roughly ten per cent of body weight.

Summer weather is deceptive. Up on the mountain it turns cold quickly once the sun disappears behind a cloud, and thunderstorms often build in the afternoon. A warm layer and a rain jacket therefore belong in the pack even under a brilliant blue sky.