Sleep in One Bed in France and Switzerland! Hotel Arbez Stands Right on the Border

Usually, travelling from one country to another means crossing a border, passing signboards or checkpoints. But at a small hotel nestled in the Jura mountains, things are entirely different.

Here, you can cross an international border on your way to the breakfast table, or sleep at night in a bed through the very middle of which runs the boundary of two countries!

This unusual hotel is called Hotel Arbez. It is located in the village of La Cure on the France-Switzerland border. The French-Swiss border runs straight through this family-run mountain hotel.

The boundary line sits right in the middle of its dining room, staircase and several guest rooms. That means you can be in two countries at the same time, staying in the same room without ever leaving the building.

It has about ten rooms and a restaurant combining both French and Swiss culinary traditions. But it is not an artificial tourist attraction; it is a fully working Alpine hotel.

This strange arrangement began with the Treaty of Dappes in the 1860s. Before the two countries redrew their border, a local businessman named Ponthus built this building right on the planned boundary line.

Under the treaty, existing buildings were allowed to remain, so the building stayed where it was. Ponthus opened a shop on one side and a bar on the other. Many years later, Jules-Joseph Arbez converted it into a hotel, and the name remains to this day.

Later, in 1958, Max Arbez jokingly declared the building a micro-state named Arbezie. The hotel in the Jura mountains is also popular for its location, serving trekkers in summer and ski lovers in winter.

The experience of walking from one country to another without even opening a door is truly rare.