Foto

I had walked out along the Pier Pâquis to photograph the lighthouse at the end of the pier. Pier Pâquis is located near the monument to the duke of Brunswick. On my way along the pier I passed a large group of 'students' with an instructor sitting on steps to the water opposite the baths located midway along the pier. I wondered why they were there but walked past them to the lighthouse. While I was taking photos near the lighthouse they had apparently changed into their swimming costumes with the aim of taking a cold water swim in the lake. This young man was the first to run past me to the lighthouse and enter the water there. Most of the others entered the water near the baths and swam on one side of the pier to the lighthouse and returned along the other side (nearest the town)to the baths. The pier it seems is a very popular bathing location in summer. The locals treat it as though it is Geneva beach. Not so in November though.
This image was quickly composed. I was not set up to take it but it turned out OK. I usually leave my camera on aperture setting but had experimenting with the speed setting for slowing the motion of the water near the lighthouse (but without filters I was unable to get it slow enough). That is why it was inadvertently set at 1/50 sec and aperture f22 for this image.

The Pâquis Baths are a facility bathhouse located on the pier on the right bank of Lake Geneva and protecting the harbor. I did not find out whether the baths are operational in summer. It seems that most people use the lake.
Originally, the Pâquis were grazing pastures outside the fortifications surrounding Geneva, down to Lake Geneva. The fortifications were dismantled from 1850 and several new neighborhoods, including the suburb Pâquis, developed beyond the land occupied by the fortifications.