Baarle Town - an interesting boundary between Belgium and the Netherlands

Arriving in Baarle town, it is possible that you are in a store standing in the Netherlands, but have just stepped out the door to Belgium.

Baarle-Nassa belongs to North Brabant province in southern Netherlands, while Baarle-Hertog is located in the province of Antwerp in Belgium. Both towns share a border area, but the international border separating the Baarle-Hertog town of Belgium and the Baarle-Nassau of the Netherlands is not a straight line or curve. Instead, the border division between these two countries is very complicated.

Parts of Belgium and the Netherlands are scattered around Baarle town. There are a total of 26 separate plots. This includes a major part of the land called Zondereigen (north of the town of Merksplas in Belgium), 22 parts of Belgium in the Netherlands and 3 other parts of the Belgian-Dutch border. In Belgium, there are also seven parts of the Netherlands, of which six are in the largest region and the seventh is in Belgium's second largest region.

Border between Belgium (yellow) and Netherlands (white)

The border line is marked with white crosses on the sidewalk and pillars on the road, running around the town, through houses, gardens and streets. Therefore, there are houses divided in half, half on the Dutch border, the other half in Belgium, and determining the nationality of households depends on the location of the main door. If the border line crosses the street, the two sections of the road will belong to two different countries.

A roadside house is bisected by the border, the left is in the Netherlands, and on the right is Belgium

This point has attracted a lot of tourists to the towns of these two countries. Many years ago, stores in Belgium were usually open on Sundays, but not in the Netherlands (except in Baarle stores). Taxes in these two countries are sometimes very different, so customers sometimes have to buy goods with two different taxes on the same street.

In the shop is still standing on Dutch soil, just a few steps away from Belgium

A more interesting case is that according to Dutch law, restaurants in this country have to close early, so for restaurants located on the border, customers often have to change tables through the Belgian boundaries. . However, with the advent of the European Union, some of these differences have been blurred.

The bizarre geographic division between Baarle-Nassa and Baarle-Hertog is the result of many complex treaties, terms, deals, and purchases between medieval dukes. After Belgium and the Netherlands were completely separated in 1839, the border line began to be determined. At that time, three border councils needed to be able to conduct border identification. And it was not until 1995 that all issues of border division between the Netherlands and Belgium were resolved.

A cafe in the Netherlands is adjacent to Belgium

The grip is cross-country, literally