St Gingolph: a town on the border between France and Switzerland

This video is our walk around a part of St Gingolph - a very pretty town on the French-Swiss border. We were only able to visit a part of the city because of the self-isolation rules at the time, so you'll the French part and only a glimpse of the Swiss one.
It still was a lovely day and a lovely walk and we absolutely enjoyed the scenery with mountains and the lake!
Let's go!
- 0:35 this small river La Morge creates a natural border between France and Switzerland.
- 0:40 Switzerland is to the right, and France- to the left of the river.
- 0:50 It may sound strange that the town is cut in half this way. This is due to the historical struggles between Savoy and the Swiss in this area.
- 01:00 in 1569, Duke of Savoy and the Bishop of Sion came to an agreement to use the river as the border, rather than continue fighting over the territory.
- 01:13 Schroedinger tourist: neither in France, nor in Switzerland🙂
- 01:50 The train line on the French territory is currently not working, while one can travel all over Switzerland from the station on the Swiss side.
- 2:05 St Gingolph has two separate municipal administrations, two postal offices and two schools...
- 2:12 ...but only one church and one cemetery!
- 2:49 Another border area, with former French customs house to the right.
- 03:00 The nature here is amazing!
- 03:10 Sorry, not allowed to any further! (cut after that until 3:19)
- 03:22 Just imagine: during World War 2, people who lived on the left were basically free, while those on the right lived under occupation. Mind-boggling!
- 03:40 The wooden hut is a former Swiss customs house
- 04:40 This is Chablais Savoyard area- very picturesque!
- 06:58 There is also apparently the longest beach on the whole lake Geneva here (about 8km long),
- 07:05 although it was under some building works when we were there.
- 07:24 Another route into Switzerland.
- 07:58 Across the lake are Swiss Riviera towns of Vevey and Montreux- our favorite places.
- 08:33. That's it for now! We hope to revisit when cross border travel is possible again.

[@shidharthkumar6372]

Good to see you well keep it ...

[@adrianmontelongo9707]

It was beautiful place France and Switzerland. Great shot there. My favorite is lake. Thank friends

[@NataEugeneTravel]

Thank you Adrian! We liked the lake a lot, too! 🥰

[@elenagoriakina4632]

Очень понравился этот городок. Так все необычно! Такая красота и покой. И история очень интересная. Замечательно!

[@NataEugeneTravel]

Спасибо! Мы рады, что прогулка понравилась!

[@letstravel300]

Such a beautiful video sharing. Thank you.

[@NataEugeneTravel]

Thank you for watching! It is a lovely place, very much look forward to revisiting it when the travel is possible again!

[@rinaboris6621]

Супер! Приятная деревенька :)

[@NataEugeneTravel]

Очень красивая, да!!

[@gpower9572]

It looks like a pretty place.

[@NataEugeneTravel]

It is very pretty indeed!!

[@gpower9572]

So can you not cross into Switzerland. I would be so tempted.

[@NataEugeneTravel]

We were very tempted, but we did not do it. Rules are rules :)

[@jfrancobelge]

@@NataEugeneTravel You could have done it. Both France and Belgium are Schengen Zone countries, which involves free movement of people between member countries. Once you're admitted in one of the countries, you're admitted in all countries of the Schengen area. The trick here is that Switzerland is not a European Union member. So, free movement of people (because Schengen) but not free movement of goods, customs restrictions in place (because not a EU member); that's normally not an issue for ordinary visitors.

[@jfrancobelge]

"Both France and Belgium"... sorry, I mean of course, "France and Switzerland".

[@NataEugeneTravel]

@@jfrancobelge Yes, you are right of course about the freedom of movement within the Schengen zone (we do it very frequently!). The reason why we wrote about the rules restricting us from crossing into Switzelrand was because we filmed this video in 2020, at the height of Covid travel restrictions. I do not remember exactly what specific rule prevented us from crossing at the time (either we did not have the test, or perhaps there was a ban on border crossing for non-residents), but we definitely were not allowed to do it back then.