What’s better than spending a day with an excited hoof gang?

On Saturday my friends and I visited Rosegg, a manor complex featuring an animal park, the manor itself and an outdoor labyrinth. It is located near Villach, a town in Austria close to the Slovenian border, so for us it was only a short drive away.

Our first stop was the animal park, which is a sort of crossover between a classic zoo and a wildlife park. It is built on and around a small hill and is amongst the largest animal parks in Austria with 30 hectares of space for the animals. The main advantage of the Rosegg animal park is that most of the animals roam free, so it feels more like a walk in nature with surprise animal encounters than a zoo.

The Rosegg animal park is divided into 2 parts: the first part after the entrance is a petting zoo with a playground for children and the second part is a circular path up around the hill. Don’t skip the petting zoo if you aren’t bringing any kids, because you can buy feed bags at the entrance and almost all of the animals will gladly eat from your hand, which is obviously the best part! The lady at the entrance laughed at us when we bought ‘viermals fütter’ – 4 feed bags.

Compared to a regular petting zoo, the one at Rosegg doesn’t just have small farm animals like rabbits and hens, but also a large selection of fancy goats, sheep, deer, two miniature donkeys and even some llamas. I love donkeys and I think it is rare that you get a chance to hand feed a llama, but my favourites were the black and white curly sheep with twisted horns. They were very similar to the Valais blacknoses. I follow a pedigree flock of them on Instagram and they are beyond cute – because are you even an adult if you don’t have a favorite sheep? All of the animals are naturally very excited to see a visitor with food, so you’ll have them clamouring for attention and climbing over each other to reach your hand, but they are all very friendly and gentle, even with children, and will let you pet them. The deer in the big fenced area at the entrance are especially cheeky.

In the second part of the park on the hill it is forbidden to feed the animals and that is where you’ll find the larger, wilder animals. Only the lynxes and the jackals have a fully closed off, caged enclosure, while the rest of the animals either roam free, such as deer, mufflons and other bovines, or have their own large fenced off areas, for example nandus, white stags and bisons. Because of the free roaming animals you are supposed to keep to the gravel walking path, which is well-maintained and wide enough for kids’ strollers or wheelchairs, but does go uphill in certain parts. There are plenty of spots with picnic benches to stop, rest and enjoy the view though.

It isn’t unusual to see capricorns hogging those picnic benches or lazing about on the ruins of the original 12th century Rosegg fort. Some of the hoof gang are more shy and so well camouflaged you’ll have to pay close attention to spot them. You’ll have no trouble spotting the peacocks though, as they’ll scream at you if you don’t. There’s also a large colony of endangered Ibis vultures flying around and apparently they return to their enclosure in Rosegg every year and are part of a wildlife conservation project.

For 17€ (as of June 2024) you can get a combined adult ticket for both the animal park and the labyrinth and the animal feed bags cost 2€, which is super worth it. Admittedly, the selection of animals in Rosegg is not as diverse as you’d find in a regular zoo, but the wildlife forest vibe and the possibility to feed the animals more than makes up for that, so it definitely ranks amongst my favourite zoos out there. I love that the animals have enough green space to get away from annoying visitors and crowds if they want, which also means that sometimes you won’t see some of them at all. The online reviews for Rosegg are therefore understandably mixed, but in my opinion you can still see (and feed) enough animals that you should get your money’s worth and more importantly, the animals are healthy and happy. My only complaint is that the lynxes should really have a larger enclosure.

Rosegg Animal park

The Rosegg manor across the street from the animal park was built in 1772 and has a very cosy, currently popular Bridgerton vibe with rosebushes and antique furniture. Nowadays it is a cafe with a nice selection of cakes and a lovely outdoor terrace where you can enjoy some rest after all the exciting animal encounters.

The labyrinth in front of the manor is a proper hedge maze with well-manicured, tall hedge lines and a super friendly ticket seller/attendant. Its design is actually difficult enough that it is fun to explore even for adults. Once you find the centre, you can exit via a bridge with a lookout tower over the top of the labyrinth, or you can go in again and find all four corner trees like we did (spoiler alert, one corner doesn’t have a tree).

Rosegg Manor and Labyrinth

All in all, Rosegg is a great day out for both adults and families with kids, particularly if you get in early when all the animals are still hungry and hyper excited to see you. 🙂

Some photos by my friends.