France was put on to German time when conquered by Nazi Germany.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_France#History
In the summer of 1940, the German military authorities switched the occupied northern part of Metropolitan France to GMT+2 (German summer time),
The Vichy authorities … adopted GMT+2 (…German summer time) in May 1941 in order to unify the railway timetables
Spain put itself on to German time because Franco was a big fan of Hitler.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_Spain#History
In 1940, Francisco Franco changed the time zone[5] by changing 16 March 1940 23:00 Greenwich Mean Time to 17 March 1940 00:00 Central European Time during World War II. This was made permanent in 1942 in order to be in line with German-occupied Europe.[6]
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/26/spain-working-hours-ending-siesta
In 1942, Spain’s dictator, General Francisco Franco, changed the country’s time zone to coincide with Germany’s in an act of solidarity with his fascist ally.
Belgium too.
https://robinfo.oma.be/en/astro-info/time/the-belgian-timezone-and-the-daylight-time-saving-system/
During the Second World War, all occupied territories, including Belgium, were required to adopt German time
Netherlands too.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_the_Netherlands#History
On 1 July 1937, the time zone of the Netherlands was simplified to UTC+00:20, and became generally known as “Dutch Time”. In 1940 when Germany occupied the Netherlands in World War II, Berlin Time (UTC+01:00) was adopted, and daylight saving time was removed. The Netherlands has retained UTC+01:00 ever since, today known as Central European Time.
Always found it weird that Spain has the same time as Poland… On the other side of Europe.
The interesting thing to me is, from what I know, they’ve seem to have just “adapted” to do everything one hour later because of this. At least that’s what it looks like to me (from Portugal). For example, in Portugal you typically have lunch at 13:00, in Spain it’s at 14:00 (same time), same thing with dinner. So even though they’re one hour later they still do things at the same time as before.
Any Spaniards here please correct me if I’m wrong, I’d love to know if my perception of this is right or not
You’re absolutely right. It’s so much more convenient your way, though; everytime I’m fortunate enough to spend a few days in your wonderful country (I’ll never get the beef between some of our fellow compatriots) I feel like I’m making the most of my days thanks to your schedule! Viva Portugal caralho!!