Here’s how to get through Beit Bridge from Zimbabwe to South Africa in less than an hour:
1. Ignore the touts who offer to do it for you for “˜only’ a few hundred rands. Give nobody your documentation. Don’t join the queue, but go through a door further to the right, clutching your car papers and beating away touts. Walk right down past all the counters and cut through the queue and hand in your passport and car papers at the last counter and pay your U$9.50 for a gate pass.
2. Then take that to the table at the opposite end of the long room and get police clearance for your vehicle, getting them to stamp the gate pass (never lose the gate pass). Next, walk right back to the counters waving all documents and tell them the police said you must get your passports stamped. Bluster a bit.
3. Then head triumphantly for your car, trailed by touts who demand your gate pass. Don’t let them get their hands on it, or on anything else. Go through the boom and stop at a small office and hand your gate pass and passport to the man for stamping and you are free!
