Driving to Mayrhofen and Hintertux: the A12, the Achensee road and the Zillertal
Can I drive to Mayrhofen without an Austrian vignette?
Yes, over the Achensee, if you accept the queue. The Zillertal sends drivers down the A12 to the Zillertal exit with a vignette, but the B181 Achenseestraße runs from the German border at the Achenpass down to the Inn valley at Wiesing on a federal road outside the ASFINAG network. It is the route drivers take to avoid the toll, busy enough that Land Tirol has regulated it with a metering light north of Achenkirch on winter Saturdays, and the Zillertal warns about it on its own arrival page.
The published route is the A12 to the Zillertal exit
The Zillertal tourist board gives one motorway instruction for every direction: the A12 Inntal Motorway to the Zillertal exit between Innsbruck and Kufstein, then the B169 up the valley. From Munich, Salzburg or Vienna it runs by Kiefersfelden onto the A12, and it marks the motorway as needing a vignette.
From the Kufstein border, the charged part is Kufstein-Süd to the Zillertal exit. The board itself points out that the digital vignette is sold for as little as one day, and a 1-day vignette each way or one 10-day Austrian vignette for the week are the two ways to cover it.
The Achensee road avoids it, and Tyrol meters it
The B181 Achenseestraße runs from the state border at the Achenpass past the Achensee to its junction in the Inn valley, beside the A12's Wiesing roundabout at the mouth of the Zillertal. It is a federal road, not part of the motorway network, so no vignette applies to it.
That is exactly why it fills up. Land Tirol ran a metering light on the B181 north of Achenkirch on four Saturdays in the winter of 2024, to keep the queues on changeover days out of the villages along the lake, and used it again on busy Saturdays in the following winters.
The Zillertal's arrival page says that on busy travel days traffic on the B181 is regulated by a traffic light, and that its operating hours depend on actual traffic and cannot be announced in advance. On a Saturday in January or February, budget for a wait at Achenkirch, or take the A12 and buy the vignette.
Every route in runs through the Brettfall tunnel
The B169 into the Zillertal passes through the Brettfall tunnel near its mouth, whichever way you reached it. The Zillertal says the tunnel is under extensive renovation, with completion scheduled for summer 2026, and that traffic may be regulated from time to time for construction or diversions until then.
If the work has run on, it affects the Achensee approach and the motorway approach equally. Check the Zillertal's page before a Saturday arrival.
Hintertux is a day car park, not a campsite
Hintertux sits at the head of the Tux valley, which leaves the Zillertal at Mayrhofen. The glacier operator's own directions are the same A12 and Zillertal exit, then on up the valley to Hintertux.
Parking at the Hintertux glacier valley station, outdoors and underground, is free by day, and the operator says the spaces are for day use only and camping on them is not allowed. The equipment the Tux valley road demands in snow is the national rule, set out on what a car needs for an Austrian ski trip.