“Apollo” landed successfully at Mondsee

One look is not enough. Even with a second one it is hardly possible to see everything. Because what has been created over the past two and a half years on the Robert Baum Promenade, directly on the banks of Lake Mondsee, is complex.

There is the “Observation Deck”, a restaurant with 107 seats. The “Mondfleckerl”, an inn that offers 198 seats, and the landing area, a kiosk, has another 56 in the outdoor area. The picture is rounded off by a modern four-star hotel with eight rooms, called the “AchtQuartier”. “Apollo” finally landed last week. More than 250 guests came to the opening of the “new tourist hotspot” at Mondsee.

Anton and Elisabeth Hargassner, heating manufacturers from Weng im Innkreis (Braunau district), had already bought the area including the 130-year-old villa from Christoph Baum, great-grandson of shipping pioneer Robert Baum, in 2016. “They said to us sons: ‘Buam, make something of it,'” said owner Anton Hargassner Junior at the opening.

Participation from the region

And that’s what they did: “We wanted to create a new, innovative center of gravity for the region, for locals and guests, and to further develop it in an economically sustainable manner. It was also important to us to preserve the space for the general public,” said Hargassner. Because the listed villa was already in danger of collapsing, it was rebuilt true to the original in 85 weeks – the Atterssee architect Franz Maul also played a key role in this.

“The whole of Mondsee is behind this project,” said Mayor Josef Wendtner (VP). It was made possible almost exclusively in collaboration with companies from Mondseeland; twelve carpenters from the region worked on the woodwork alone.

Hargassner was able to win Juliana and Daniel Döllerer as tenants for hotels and restaurants – both are also from Mondsee, but have experience from Luxembourg, Germany and Zanzibar. And both want to work primarily with regional ingredients: the eggs come from St. Lorenz, the goat cheese from Tiefgraben and the meat from the Innviertel. The aim is to appeal to everyone: locals, tourists, athletes and romantics.

Already in 2021, Hargassner took over the Meindl shipping company as majority owner and integrated it into the “Apollo” concept. The already aging excursion ship MS Mondseeland was completely renovated and modernized and put back into operation as a “state-of-the-art passenger ship” in May 2022.