Ovčiji Brod: The Bridge Older Than the Višegrad Bridge, Yet Almost Unknown

For much of its course, the Zalomka River runs underground during the summer months, making it the largest sinking river in Europe. This bridge-ford also served as an everyday crossing whenever the Zalomka happened to flow above ground. The extraordinary, one-of-a-kind karst landscape surrounding the bridge forms a genuine oasis of peace and natural beauty.

Ovčiji Brod, the bridge located in the village of Bratač near Nevesinje, is a masterpiece of the builders' craft of its era - a structure most likely raised by the Ottomans in the sixteenth century or later, with its name given by the shepherds who used it to move their flocks across the river.

No exact records survive, but the bridge, crossed over the centuries by nomads, armies, and ordinary people alike, was built long before Višegrad's famous "Bridge on the Drina." Every bridge, this one included, is a piece of history - but Ovčiji Brod is more than that. It's a bridge people grew up alongside, one whose paths carried the fortunate and unfortunate alike toward justice, freedom, and hope for a better tomorrow.

Its construction style recalls the Old Bridge in Mostar. A carved plaque on the bridge marks 1883, the year one of its arches was restored, while in 2011 the Kingdom of the Netherlands, through a project called "Building the Road to Ovčiji Brod Bridge," built two kilometers of unpaved rural road leading to this attraction - making the site faster and easier to reach.