‘A shack in a godforsaken place’: The world’s worst border crossings

The borders between countries, we are sometimes led to believe, are not what they used to be. Here in this first quarter of the 21st century, travel is increasingly seamless. Or so the rhetoric goes.

Sometimes it is. Even in the post-Brexit era, once you have made it into Europe’s Schengen Area, you can hop between nations with barely more than a road sign to tell you that you have crossed a boundary. Indeed, wander from Belgium into Holland, or Spain into Portugal, and just about the only clue that anything has changed will be the ping of a new network service provider on your phone.

An officer on the Chinese-Russian border.Credit: Getty Images

But then, some borders are exactly as they used to be. Fences. Desks. Queues. Impassive men in some sort of uniform. That slow flick-flick of their fingers through your passport, while you stand there in silence, suddenly feeling like a naughty school pupil all over again.

These borders make for far more frustrating journeys. But they can also make for better stories. Horror stories, in some cases. Here, 10 travel writers recall some of their least pleasant experiences in dealing with peaked caps, unwelcoming glares, and all the other facets of gate-keeping officialdom.

“Where are you going today, sir/madam?”

To China, to Mozambique, to Russia. And even to the United States…

Russia-China

By Chris Moss

Writer Chris Moss made a stop-off at Irkutsk, in Siberia.Credit: iStock

I’d always dreamed of catching the Trans-Siberian. Call me a completist trainspotting geek, but how could a lad who grew up a mile from England’s Liverpool and Manchester Railway not want to ride on the world’s longest, most storied line through the world’s biggest nation? But, as I was working at the time on a guidebook to Beijing, I decided to take the Trans-Manchurian. I also calmed down my completism and broke the journey at Irkutsk, where I had a house-stay and walked on frozen Lake Baikal.

The trip took eight days, and four were spent with a gloomy, or tired, or both, Russian military man who slept a lot and never spoke to me. I found a livelier chap at the other end of the carriage, and I had a fun time with him and his wife, drinking vodka and eating smoked fish.

The wait to have your passport returned is always a nervous one.Credit: Alamy

The Chinese train from Irkutsk was a border of sorts, as my cabin was filled with pot noodle-slurping boys who talked incessantly. At the actual Russian-Manchurian border I encountered only two types of miserable human beings: the surly, hateful Russian border guard, shivering in his cold office, and the barking, rude, hateful Chinese border guard, also shivering.

But the main thing I noticed as we made the night crossing was the sudden noise. Russia had been eerily silent, spacious and expansive, all taiga and snow. China was full of people and they all seemed to like disorder, as if it might heat up the winter. I suddenly missed Europe, even in its quasi-alien Russian form. When I finally got to Beijing it was all turnstiles and crowd-control.

Malawi-Mozambique

By Mike MacEacheran

Up at 4am, I was in a rattly, overcrowded minibus, with the Mwanza-Zóbuè crossing hours away and the Malawian city of Blantyre in the cracked rear-view. A little forgotten now – perhaps, because I’ve tried to blot it out some 22 years later – I was on the road to Mozambique, with only my gut instinct to go on.

When the driver finally kicked everyone out, we were still several kilometres from the border. Six-and-a-half kilometres away, in fact. Money changers swooped in. Overpriced motorbike taxis circled. At the crossing point, little more than a roadside shack in a God-forsaken place, a grumpy official, all jowls and sweat, flicked away my passport with a few snarled words. No hotel reservation, no entry, he spat, but I really wasn’t sure. A rifle-shouldering guard strong-armed me out the door. Outside, it was so hot the dogs didn’t even raise their heads.

The next few hours were sacrificed returning to what I’d call the loneliest village in Malawi; tracking down a working computer and printer (not easy in those days); booking a hotel in a city called Chimoio (the less said about the place the better); then returning by motorbike (exorbitant, of course) to find the same toad-like official grimacing once more.

Finally, with all my best moves exhausted and the light fading, I took a risk and my wallet landed on his desk. His expression softened. It was all in a day’s work for him, so I bribed my way across. Worst $50 I’ve ever spent.

Canada-USA

By Chris Leadbeater

Crossing from Canada into the US via the Rainbow Bridge can be a miserable experience.Credit: iStock

The name makes it sound like some sort of illuminated stairway to heaven – the Rainbow Bridge, spanning both the Niagara River and the US-Canadian border, almost within splashing range of the endlessly famous waterfall which froths and roars at this particular dotted line on the map. It is well worth crossing it, going north, from America into its neighbour – because the views of Niagara Falls from the Canadian side are (generally deemed to be) more impressive than those from the opposite bank. But our own journey in this direction came at a cost. In time, stress levels, and, ultimately, money.

This was, I should explain, in the vaguely-still-undigitised mists of the mid-2000s, when you still had to fill in a card form to enter the US – and surrender its lower portion on your exit. We had done this, as instructed, into a letterbox on the gate at the American end of the bridge – and hopped to Canada, where the welcome was clipped, but friendly. Not so the two US border officials who greeted us on our return a couple of hours later.

Where were our exit cards? (In the letterbox on the gate outside, as the sign requested.)

Had we entered the US illegally? (We had not. We had landed in New York, at JFK, a week earlier, at the date and time on this boarding pass stub. This will all be on record.)

Why are you coming to the US today? (To continue a holiday – a honeymoon, no less – that will take place entirely in your country, save for the two hours we’ve just spent in Canada, to see the Falls from a different angle. That’s literally our hire car over there, outside the uninspiring hotel you can see through the window. It has all our things in it.)

The last admission was a mistake. The pair of them – moustachioed, tubby, sweaty in spite of the chilly autumn day – knew they had us trapped between a waterfall and some sort of hard place. There were frowns, mutterings, gestures towards a bench in the corner.

We were soon joined there by other travellers, as a pattern became clear. Those who had foolishly followed the apparent rules, and surrendered their proof of exit without proof of doing so, were harassed, quizzed, and, eventually, made to fill out an extra form – to exit “properly” before they could re-enter. And there was a fee, of $US10. Cash only. No receipt.

We paid up, crossed the border, and drove away, relieved that this “fine” had been a relatively paltry amount – maybe a heavy, unswerving leaning on unclear and confusing regulations, or maybe just a shakedown for beer bucks. But, to this day, I can clearly recall the names of Officers [Redacted] and [Redacted] – and their sneering, piggy faces.

UK-Mexico

By Anthony Peregrine

My first trip across the Atlantic – decades ago – and I was looking pretty cool: flares, tie-dyed shirt, old-school blazer, hair as far down my back as Willie Nelson’s. Talk about a rebel. Was Mexico City ready for this?

In the event, yes. Absolutely. Rather too much so. Right at the airport. I was walking through “Nothing To Declare” when two customs men beckoned, then pulled me over and pushed me into a side room, just like they do with drug runners on TV. But I was clean. I was British. No worries. Then the scissors came out and the younger of the two fellows started pulling my hair. Then he said something very serious. I didn’t speak Spanish – correcting that was one reason for being in Mexico – but I didn’t need to.

The swarthy, well-dressed chap made it clear that Mexican authorities took a dim view of long-haired louts waltzing into their country showing no respect for internationally-recognised standards of Mexican decorum. I was suddenly terrified. You really didn’t want to be in a bare side room with two Mexicans brandishing big scissors. And without money.

With an extraordinary stroke of luck, the bloke meeting me at the airport had spotted my being channelled out of the mainstream. He was a Mexican citizen. He argued and barged his way through to the side room. He was fantastically polite with the customs men – agreeing, as he explained later, that such stupidly long hair was indeed an affront to Mexican sensibilities. Might a few banknotes ease their pain? Yes, they might. Just this once.

We left. The following morning I was at the barber’s. I emerged looking like a solicitor. I had no further difficulties with Mexican officialdom. Nor have I had any on subsequent trips. These are outstanding people – and I’m sure they’ll prove this if and when I travel there again.

Mongolia-Russia

By Phoebe Smith

The Russia-Mongolia border is not a high point of riding the Trans-Siberian train.Credit: Alamy

Arriving at border control after a long flight is one thing, but doing it in the dead of night, while sleeping, was anything but a dream.

It was the sniggering that woke me. Lying on my bunk, wrapped in warm blankets, I was suddenly aware of someone standing over me. I opened my eyes and looked to see two female border guards leafing through my passport, pointing and laughing at the photo page. They exchanged a few words then, said something to me in Russian.

I was on the Trans-Mongolian line of the Trans-Siberian train, a journey which – before the war with Ukraine saw it closed to westerners – allowed intrepid travellers the chance to traverse the great swathe of Russian Siberia, as well as part of China and the steppes of Mongolia. While the China to Mongolia border crossing had been a breeze, in the no-man’s land between here and Russia, amid lines of barbed wire, my ability to go any further was down to the two women who were giggling at me.

It was 3am and I was half asleep, so trying to work out what was happening was hard. They took ages to decide if I could come into the country – continuously chatting, leaving the carriage then coming back to me to mutter a few more phrases. It may have only been 10 minutes in reality until they finally returned with my passport stamped, but the whole time I was cold with dread, convinced I’d be turfed out into the scrub of land in between borders. For me this had been a dream trip, but at this moment it threatened to become a nightmare.

Yugoslavia-Hungary

By William Cook

Today, travelling to Budapest by train is a breeze, but when I first went there, 40 years ago, during the Cold War, Hungary was behind the Iron Curtain. You needed a visa to go there, and entering the country was a lot more tricky. When my night train stopped at the border, in the small hours, I showed the inspector my visa and my ticket. He told me I also had to pay for a seat reservation. Unless I bought one, there and then, I’d have to get off the train.

Outside it was completely dark. We were in the middle of nowhere. I suspected this was a sly ruse to shake me down for some western currency, but I had no cash, only traveller’s cheques, which he dismissed with disdain. As I was offering him my cheap wristwatch, a suave Russian came to my aid. He shooed the man away and sat down beside me.

“Is this your first visit to a socialist country?” he asked me. “No,” I said. “I’ve just come from Yugoslavia.” “Yugoslavia is not a socialist country,” he replied. We talked through the night, all the way to Budapest. By the time we arrived, at dawn, he knew everything about me. As we said goodbye, I realised I didn’t even know his name.

Five years later the Berlin Wall came down and I travelled to Berlin, where I got talking to an East Berliner. I told him about the Russian Anglophile who’d befriended me on that night train. “You do realise he was probably KGB?” said the East Berliner. “He’d been told to find out all about you, what you intended to do in Hungary. If you’d been any smarter, he could have made trouble for you. Luckily for you, he decided you were harmless, too daft to be any risk – or any use.” I didn’t know whether to feel aggrieved or relieved. A bit of both, I suppose. Nowadays, I never travel without at least a little hard cash.

Papua New Guinea-Australia

By Benedict Allen

Entering Papua New Guinea from Australia through the notorious Torres Strait will raise some eyebrows. Credit: Justin McManus

We weren’t a pretty sight – lips swollen from the salt spray, eyes puffed up from staring too long and desperately for the horizon – and that might have been one reason why the Australian officials were suspicious. Another might have been that we’d travelled in a traditional open boat from Papua New Guinea across the notorious Torres Strait. No one did that crossing unless they were drug- or people-smugglers. Or else mad explorers – and even they hadn’t done it for a good few hundred years.

But now, swaying with fatigue, my indigenous companions and I had made it to the northern tip of the continent – but only having lost our food and water in a storm. Marooned on a little rock, we’d survived off limpets.

“Stay right where you are!” barked the harbour master.

“Any chance of a little drink?” I said weakly.

“You’ve had more than enough already,” said a policeman, arriving. “Drunkards,” he muttered disdainfully – and reached for the handcuffs.

We sat in the boat, telling our story. And I noticed some ant stowaways jumping ashore: they too looked relieved to have made it.

Ethiopia-Djibouti

By Sarah Marshall

Carved up by careless colonialists with less precision than a drunken butcher, the Horn of Africa is a muddle of uncomfortable borders. Attempting to cross from one territory to another is met with suspicion, even if stepping into arguably the most unloved country in the world.

In Djibouti, where ambulances routinely drive away from the dying unless they have deep pockets, money is everything. If only I’d known that before trying to enter from Ethiopia on a road trip a few years ago.

At a crossing point in Dewele, I waited impatiently to show my passport. Flicking through the pages, the bored attendant’s eyes lit up like two missiles on target.

“You can’t come in,” he said gleefully, pointing to an unused visa for Guinea-Bissau, a painful reminder of a trip I’d had to cancel at the eleventh hour due to an outbreak of Ebola. “You’re contaminated.”

The fact it had never been stamped or dated didn’t matter.

“Do I look like I have a deadly disease?” I asked, wondering if three weeks without a decent washroom had taken its toll.

But nothing for the next couple of hours would make him budge – until I sighed and reached into my pocket. If only global pandemics could be erased so easily with a few dollars. But in a place where life is valued in decimal points, I shouldn’t have been surprised

South Africa-Rhodesia

By Hilary Bradt

In hindsight, I can understand the hostility of the white Rhodesian (now Zimbabwe) border officials to backpackers. In 1976 their privileged way of life was doomed but they were still – just – in charge and they were going to make the most of it.

We’d been warned about the border at Beitbridge by the backpackers’ grapevine. The officials were known to be unpleasant to anyone who crossed on foot rather than the “correct” way by car – but quite how hostile took us by surprise. Our documents were in perfect order; we’d taken the precaution of buying air tickets to Malawi for the required evidence of onward travel.

“You should have air tickets to your home country – America,” was the response. We countered by showing him that we had “sufficient funds”. He brushed that aside. “You won’t get a lift to Salisbury so won’t be able to use your air tickets.” We then had to brace ourselves to ask to be stamped in on a separate piece of paper to ease our journey through the countries to the north. His response? “If I had my way I wouldn’t offer you this courtesy.” Annoyingly, he was right on one thing. We waited four hours before anyone stopped to give us a lift.

Estonia-Russia

By Gavin Haines

Crossing the Friendship Bridge between Estonia and Russia is anything but friendly.Credit: iStock

They call it the Friendship Bridge, which is a laugh. Nothing wrapped in barbed wire is ever friendly. Spanning the Navara River, the ironically named crossing is a busy route between Estonia and Russia – or was in 2011, when I visited. Estonia closed it to traffic when Russian tanks started rolling into Ukraine. Some friendship.

I crossed one winter’s night by coach with my then girlfriend. Apprehensively, we approached the Russian checkpoint, where dead-in-the-eyes guards marched us off the coach. Under bright lights in a freezing building nearby, they poured over our particulars. One of them disputed my passport photograph, claiming it wasn’t me. I’d had a haircut, I said, but it was definitely me. We argued. My girlfriend pleaded.

The other passengers were back on the coach already and our driver was hanging out of the door impatiently. I pleaded now. Suddenly, the border guard threw my passport down and waved me away. We scooped up our belongings and boarded the coach. It had all, we realised later, been an exercise in fear and control. Welcome to Russia.

The Telegraph, London