Hoče-Slivnica, thousand-year-old churches below Pohorje

What Hoče-Slivnica is

According to SURS, the municipality has 12,061 residents on 1 January 2026, spread over thirteen settlements, the largest being Spodnje Hoče with 2,752. In 2025 it logged 28,776 arrivals, the third-highest figure in Podravje after Maribor and Ptuj. The number makes sense once you read its tourist office’s list of places to stay, because much of it is up on Hočko and Slivniško Pohorje, with the Mariborska koča hut, the Storžek cabin at 1,030 m and the flats of the Bolfenk settlement at the top of Mariborsko Pohorje.

The 10th-century Hoče crypt

According to the tourist office, it dates from the 10th century. It lies under the chancel and south chapel of St George’s Church and is made up of two rooms set at right angles. The present entrance was made in the later 1700s, when it was used for burials. Visits are arranged through the parish.

The church above is recorded in 1146, though it’s older than that, and its parish was one of the first in Slovenian Styria. It has an early 15th-century Gothic chancel, a baroque nave, a tower with an onion dome, late baroque altars by Jožef Holzinger and a Roman altar to Mithras. To my mind this ensemble is a highlight of the Maribor area and deserves to be far better known.

Slivnica, Hompoš and the Brandis manor

St Mary’s Church in Slivnica is also recorded in 1146 and keeps a pre-Romanesque stone slab with interlace carving on its façade. It has a late Romanesque nave, a 15th-century tower and a mid-18th-century high altar by Jožef Straub. Hompoš castle, above Pivola, was the first seat of the Drava margrave and since 2008 has housed the University of Maribor’s Faculty of Agriculture. In Slivnica, the manor first recorded in 1378 took on its present look around 1862 under Count Brandis.

Once your dates are set, check which hotels are still free in Hočko Pohorje before prices climb.

Staying up on Pohorje

On the Fram stream, the Skalca waterfall drops 12 m over an amphibolite step and is one of the larger falls on Pohorje. It’s a ten-minute walk from the junction where the Hoče to Areh road meets the one up to the top cable car station. Higher still, St Leonard’s Church, recorded in 1529, has early baroque altars and a floor of white Pohorje marble.

Festivals and moving on

The festival calendar opens with Jurjevanje, on the Sunday nearest 24 April, followed by maypole raising, the StellarBeat electronic music festival in late June by the Hoče gravel pit, Rogoška noč in late August and the municipal holiday in the last week of September. Maribor Edvard Rusjan Airport sits within the municipality at Orehova vas, 9 km from the railway station in Maribor, but its operator says it’s now mostly used by flying schools, so to arrive by air look at the airports near Slovenia. Heading north, Šentilj is the crossing into Austria.

If you would rather have a local show you round, book a guided tour in Hočko Pohorje and choose by the reviews.

Once your dates are set, check which hotels are still free in Hočko Pohorje before prices climb.