Pheasant Island

Tiny river island that alternates between French and Spanish sovereignty every six months

Pheasant Island — Île des Faisans in French, Isla de los Faisanes in Spanish — is a tiny, uninhabited sliver of land in the middle of the Bidasoa River. It is the site of the 1659 Treaty of the Pyrenees, and it remains, by that treaty, a condominium: it belongs to France from February to July and to Spain from August to January, alternating sovereignty every six months. This makes it technically the world's smallest condominium territory and one of the more unusual pieces of real estate in Europe.

The island is not accessible to visitors — it's a protected historical site managed alternately by the prefectures of Bayonne and Hondarribia — but you can see it clearly from the banks of the Bidasoa near the French-Spanish border crossing. It's easy to combine with a walk across the border to Hondarribia, the handsome Spanish walled town directly opposite.

things to do sight
A story
On 7 June 1659, the Treaty of the Pyrenees was signed on this island, ending 24 years of war between France and Spain. The negotiation itself lasted months, with Cardinal Mazarin and Don Luis de Haro meeting on the island for weeks of talks. The treaty permanently established the Pyrenees as the Franco-Spanish border and arranged the marriage of Louis XIV to the Spanish Infanta María Teresa — a union that would eventually help trigger the War of the Spanish Succession.