Sleek peak

Barbara Elwardt remembers being anything but thrilled when a friend insisted that she visited Bad Gastein, a sleepy village in the Austrian Alps, 20 years ago. “I just didn’t see a reason for going to the mountains and not skiing,” Elwardt tells Monocle. Little did she know that she would return every year and eventually open a hotel there: The Comodo. And the skiing nearby goes on until late April. 

It’s hard not to be charmed by Bad Gastein. The town, about an hour-and-a-half drive south of Salzburg, boasts a charming mix of belle epoque build…