Schengen: A tiny village that changed European travel.

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The now-renowned Schengen Agreement was signed in a tiny village in Luxembourg’s south-east, a location that was drenched in symbolism.


▼ Blink, and you could pass through Europe’s smaller nations without realising. Take Luxembourg, which can be crossed by car in just over an hour at its widest point. Before you know it, you’ve popped out into the surrounding countries of France, Germany or Belgium, with only the eagle-eyed spying the border sign and the striped flags of the Grand Duchy far behind.
The ability to do this is partly down to its petite size, but also thanks to a Luxembourgian legacy: a treaty signed more than  30 years agoin the tiny village of Schengen in the country’s far south-east. The now-renowned Schengen Agreementdramatically changed the way we travel within Europe, and continues to evolve today.
Not-so-little Luxembourg
On the surface of things, Luxembourg could be viewed as a starchy centre of commerce, where European bigwigs busy themselves and money is made. It also appears to take up very little space on the map and, as a result, is often unwittingly overlooked as a destination in favour of its more sizeable neighbours.
A founding member of what is now the European Union, the diminutive country is home to one of the EU’s three capitals – Luxembourg City (along with Brussels and Strasbourg) – and remains a key player in the running of the union.
It stands out as a constitutional monarchy wedged between the two giant republics of France and Germany, and has paid the price for its location in not one, but two world wars, ensuring there’s plenty of history on offer. There’s a flourishing domestic wine industry, an impressive restaurant scene, countless museums and memorials (from the Unesco-listed fortress and old city centreto the grave of General George S Patton  Jr), and a seemingly inherent love of seafood, cheese and all things pastry.
In 1985, Luxembourg was also instrumental in the creation of a landmark legislation: the signing of the Schengen Treaty, a unilateral agreement ensuring border-free travel within European member countries.
On the trail of this historic spot, I travelled down the Moselle Valley, a quiet, unassuming part of eastern Luxembourg. The Moselle River lazily acting as a natural border between Luxembourg and Germany. The valley is evidently central to the country’s wine production, with row upon row of vineyards draped over the low-lying hillsides interrupted only by a scattering of towns and villages.
Just as I thought I was running out of country, I arrived at tiny Schengen, tucked in among the vines on the western bank of the Moselle. With fewer than 520 residents, it’s certainly not the big-name, bright-lights destination one might expect for an agreement that would change the way people travelled in Europe. Nevertheless, it was here, on a murky morning on 14 June 1985, that representatives of Belgium, France, Luxembourg, West Germany (as was) and the Netherlands gathered to officially seal the deal on this revolutionary new border-free zone.  
A bit of background (▪ ▪ ▪)

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