At The Cottage With The Ziga Family Top
Mornings often split between small projects and unhurried play. Mr. Ziga trims a dock board or mends a fishing net while Aunt Mira sorts jars of pickles and jam. The older kids take down kayaks; the younger ones practice skipping stones and invent new games with found sticks. Lunch is a picnic of sandwiches and cold salads eaten on a sun-warmed picnic table. The lake glitters like glass; conversations drift to the sounds of loons and the distant hum of a motorboat.
The keyword ranking is not accidental. Travel review sites have tried to categorize the Ziga experience. Is it "luxury"? No. Is it "budget"? Not exactly. It is, as one user put it, "The top choice for disconnecting to reconnect."
For Kids: There are no iPads in the cottage. Instead, the Ziga children (who live in a separate small house behind the main cottage) will challenge your kids to a stick boat race down the stream. Your children will come back covered in mud, carrying frogs, and smiling with genuine teeth.
For Parents: The absence of deadlines and the presence of the Ziga matriarch’s babysitting services (she adores children) mean you can actually finish a chapter of a book. Or nap in the hammock. Or simply stare at the ceiling of the porch listening to the rain.
For Grandparents: The lower level bedroom has a private entrance, a handrail in the shower, and a view of the bird feeder. It is accessible, quiet, and perfectly heated by the radiant floor system installed by the Ziga sons last winter. at the cottage with the ziga family top
As the sun begins to dip behind the pines, the property transforms. The string lights over the fire pit flicker on. This is the "Top" hour. The family brings out a homemade liqueur (usually wild plum or honey) and a guitar missing two strings (strangely, no one ever replaces them; the imperfect chords sound like home).
Dinner is served family-style on the veranda. It might be a chili from last year’s garden harvest, fresh bread baked in the outdoor clay oven, and a salad of tomatoes that taste like the sun. Guests often weep during this meal. Not from sadness, but from the overwhelming nostalgia for a life they never lived.
Rumors circulated in early 2026 that a viral influencer offered the Ziga family €50,000 to install a hot tub on the top balcony. The family declined. They also declined a Netflix documentary offer.
"We are not a brand," says young Luka Ziga. "We are a family. The 'top' will always be a small, strange, beautiful room above a cow barn. That is the point." Mornings often split between small projects and unhurried
However, the family has announced one change for 2027: the addition of a small library in the top loft's hallway. The books will be in Slovenian, English, and German. All of them will be about nature, solitude, and mushrooms.
If you are lucky enough to have received a confirmation letter from Matija Ziga, here is your packing list.
Do Bring:
Do NOT Bring:
Mrs. Žiga makes a version of the famous Bled cream cake that is better than any hotel bakery. Her secret? She uses quark cheese from their neighbor’s goats and tops it with a caramelized almond crust.
You walk down the spiral stairs. The ground floor kitchen is roaring. Luka Ziga (the son, a trained chef who left a job in Vienna to return home) is making štruklji—rolled dumplings filled with tarragon and cottage cheese. You eat at the communal table. You are sitting next to a botanist from Berlin and a retired opera singer from Milan. The "top" has brought you all together.
The Ziga family’s cottage sits at the end of a gravel lane, where maples lean over a narrow lake inlet and the air smells of pine and wood smoke. It’s the kind of place that changes the rhythm of a visit: phones dim, voices slow, and small rituals — morning coffee on the dock, barefoot walks, and dusk card games — stitch the days together.
