I recall that when I was in then West Germany, we once traveled to Luxembourg, and what a feeling it was to see that the border was already open there. (Schengen was ratified in 1985 but fully implemented only in 1995.) My next experience was only a decade later, on a trip across Austria, Germany and France to Britain.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

where I grew up, the border was obvious - the Rhine, only a handful of bridges to cross it, but there were no controls already back in the 70s (and when I say no controls, I mean the border was often not even manned).

As a kid, I used to bike to Germany to go to the swimming pool (there was a nicer open-air swimming pool on the German side) and i was never ever controlled.

Locals would honk non locals that stopped at the border signs and wondered what they should do, given the absence of border guards...

In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes

The French-Spanish border was practically completely open from, as I remember, after Franco kicked the bucket, and then almost disappeared with Schengen.

OTOH, Britain is of course not Schengen. The only time border police ever hassled me was going into Britain (Heathrow) from France, because my passport was out of date. This was perfectly legal, specifically allowed by law. And I was entering my own country. Just a plain-clothes cop swinging his weight. Gaaah.

The France - Switzerland border has been essentially unmanned for quite some time, i.e. a decade and a half, except at a few larger crossings.

Three years ago I hiked the length of the Jura mountains ; crossing the border quite a few times, walking on its length too. We got checked only once, at the last border crossing, as we were along a large road.


Un roi sans divertissement est un homme plein de misères

Nope, never crossed any 'new' border. But just the other day I was on a night train from Basel to Copenhagen and at the German-Danish border, at 06h30 or some suchlike ungodly hour the door was wrested open, and a demand for passports was issued. I, still partly asleep, and certainly not happy about having been so brutally awakened, crankely barked back: "Don't we have some treaty about this? Maybe an EU directive as well, prohibiting the waking of sleeping passengers before dawn? What is this? A fascist state? Papers, please? At this hour?" The passport guy went away, identification documents unseen. I fell back asleep.

Maybe this Schengen thing is a bit of a joke? Or, at least not enough to prevent the undue hassling of sleeping folks? Maybe the border people just have to be reminded of the open borders thing from time to time? I have no idea what that was all about!

I must have crossed the border between Spain and Portugal a number of times while on vacation in Galicia with my parents when I was a child, but I have no recollection of border checks. Then again, I wasn't really paying attention.

We have met the enemy, and he is us — Pogo