Sopje

Sopje is a small settlement on the flat Podravina plain of Virovitica-Podravina County, close to the Drava and the Hungarian border. Its principal historic landmark is St Mary Magdalene’s Church, whose origins reach back to the 14th century; the local parish was re-established in 1694 after the Ottoman period. Beyond the village, fields and drainage channels give way to the backwaters and floodplain woods of the Mura–Drava Regional Park, part of UNESCO’s transboundary Mura–Drava–Danube Biosphere Reserve. The most immediate way to experience that landscape is at Sopje’s riverside recreation area, where benches and barbecue facilities stand beside the Drava and low summer water levels have traditionally created a local bathing spot. Sopje is therefore better suited to an unhurried riverside day and a short ride through the surrounding plain than to a packed museum itinerary. The community’s relationship with the river also shapes the local calendar: at the 2025 Fishermen’s Day, teams gathered at the Sopje recreation ground to prepare carp and fiš-paprikaš, Slavonia’s paprika-rich fish stew.

Sopje is the administrative centre of the municipality of the same name in Virovitica-Podravina County, with the municipal office at 20 Kralja Tomislava Street. The municipality’s northern edge follows the Drava and forms part of the Mura-Drava Regional Park. Its local identity also rests on the parish of St Mary Magdalene, recorded in the 1334 list of Zagreb Diocese parishes. Arable land accounts for 74.74% of the municipal area, while wet grasslands, oxbow channels and floodplain woods survive along the Drava.