What Do The Swiss Call Lake Geneva

Lake Geneva is a huge body of water that is found near the center of the continent of Euopre. It is shared by the countries of Switzerland and France. More than half of the lake falls under Swiss control. It is known as the second-largest body of freshwater in Europe. Here are some facts that you probably did not know about Lake Geneva.

-Lake Geneva is its English name, it is called either Lac Leman or Lac de Geneve in French, Genfer See in German and Lago Lemano or Lago di Ginerva in Italian.

-Race car driver Michael Shumacher lives in a Lake Geneva lakeview home.

-Award winning singer Phil Collins owns a home that looks over the lake.

-Was a popular vacation spot of many authors, believed to be the location where the story of Frankenstein was written.

-Sixty-percent of the lake is located in Switzerland and forty percent of the lake is located in France.

-Because of its moon-like shape, it is often separated into the large lake, which is the eastern part, and the small lake, which lies in the west.

-For much of the twentieth century the lake was very heavily polluted and deemed dangerous.

-A famous story of Lake Geneva tells of a group traveling in Lake Geneva in a submarine and not being able to see anything outside of the windows because of the ridiculously high levels of pollution.

-A massive clean up effort was instrumented by Switzerland and France and it is believed that the lake is clean and safe for use today.

-Lake Geneva was the site for the original measurement of the speed of sound, performed by Jacques Charles Francois of France and Daniel Collodon of Switzerland in the 1820's.