Farmhotel & Chalets Grosslehen sits on a sunny plateau above Fieberbrunn in Tyrol, with a view that takes in four mountain ranges: the Kitzbühel Alps, the Wilder Kaiser and the Loferer and Leoganger Steinberge. At its heart is a farmhouse built in 1632, where people and animals have lived side by side ever since. The same family has run the place for five generations, and today it is a four-star hotel that calls itself the first farm hotel in the Kitzbühel Alps.
The farm is not decoration. Scottish Highland cattle, donkeys, deer, goats, ponies and Kune Kune pigs live on more than ten hectares of land around the hotel, and the host family works it themselves. Guests are invited to take part rather than watch from the terrace: there is a weekly tour of the farm, a vegetable and herb garden that supplies the kitchen, and picnics in that garden can be booked.
There are 24 rooms and suites, split between two buildings. The old farmhouse has the character you would expect from a building of its age, with nooks and sloping ceilings, and it shares a roof with the spa, the restaurant parlours and the bar. The estate house is the quieter of the two, a little set apart but close to the natural swimming pond. Around that pond stand six chalets, each on two floors with three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a private Finnish sauna, a fireplace, a living and dining area and a panoramic terrace of its own. The chalets can be booked all year on a self-catering basis, and with breakfast or half board in the seasons when the hotel itself is open.
The kitchen works from what the farm and the Pillerseetal produce. Beef and venison come from the hotel's own animals, fruit, herbs and vegetables from its garden, and fish, organic eggs and cheese from farmers in the valley. Breakfast brings home-baked bread and pastries made from old family recipes. In the evening there are three five-course menus to choose from: the grandmother's favourite classics, traditional Tyrolean farmhouse cooking, and a vegetarian menu built on the garden. Dinner is served in the restaurant or on the terrace by the pond, and the hotel says the kitchen has been recognised by Gault & Millau several times.
The Farm Spa is built from local materials and has two saunas, a steam bath, a wooden relaxation lounge and a sunbathing lawn with mountain views, and the swimming pond doubles as the cold plunge. Yoga, forest bathing, Ayurveda massages and sound healing sessions with Tyrolean harp music round it off, and there is a gym with Technogym cardio and strength equipment.
In summer, hiking and mountain bike trails start right at the door, and the weekly programme includes guided hikes and bike tours, wine tastings and a Kaiserschmarrn cooking class. In winter, Fieberbrunn is the way into the Skicircus Saalbach Hinterglemm Leogang Fieberbrunn, with around 270 km of pistes and 70 lifts. The hotel runs a free daily ski shuttle to the valley station and has a ski room with boot heaters, and a floodlit toboggan run, a cross-country trail and winter walking paths start next to the hotel. Dogs are welcome and have a meadow of their own.
Fieberbrunn is about two hours by car from Munich, roughly an hour and a half from the airports at Salzburg and Innsbruck, and half an hour from Kitzbühel. The hotel offers a shuttle from Fieberbrunn railway station, and there is parking with charging points for electric cars. According to the hotel, you will not need snow chains to get up there.
The people in this picture are AI-generated.
