San Ysidro Port of Entry

Alright so it’s a port of entry, don’t really know how this could ever be a 5 stars experience but it has drastically improved over the last few years. They opened up a lot more lanes to make it a bit quicker but still, be prepared to wait for hours on the weekends. If you are trying to cross during the weekend it is best to cross between 4am-​6am. The wait is usually only about 20 min. I’ve tried crossing on a Saturday night around 10pm but gave up because the wait time was almost 4 hours! I do prefer this port of entry over the one in Otay due to increased security at this port of entry.

It’s been almost 10 years since I have crossed the border at San Ysidro and overall, the experience was better than I expected!
This border crossing is notoriously busy and I’ve heard stories of friends stuck in line for hours. We crossed about 3pm on a weekday and our wait was about 45 mins, which I didn’t think was too bad.
From the direction we came (east of the lines), we were put into the ready lanes. I wasn’t sure what this meant, but I knew it wasn’t Sentri (I saw those clearly marked and I don’t have it), but there was also NO other way I could have gotten across all the congested (stopped) lanes of traffic, so I just proceeded on.
Bought some fresh hot churros while we waited because #obviously
When we got up to the gate, we gave the officer our documents. He was a very nice guy and checked our documents and peered into my car, taking about 3 minutes in total. I didn’t feel like it was overly invasive in the slightest! I like that they want to keep our country safe! He then said that we were in a line only for people who had a passport card and next time just make sure to go to the lane for cars with paper docs. Fine and all, but like I said, it would have been impossible for me to cross that many lanes and I don’t think the signage was helpful in directing me which lane to be in. Somehow there needs to be lanes for both paper and ready docs no matter which side you approach the border from.
If you cross the border semi-​regularly, it’s worth it to get global entry/​Sentri to save a ton of time!

The border… It is hilarious crossing this border…
The border itself is whatever. it’s nothing but rock, and metal, and people preventing cars from zooming through without proper documentation.
The entertaining yet depressing part is all the hoopla before reaching el norte.
The plethora of street vendors, beggers, and random trademark infringed goods that Mexicans are slanging. Heck they even had viagra!!!
The border guards were courteous to our caravan. No complaints on my end.
I still have a conspiracy theory…
The border takes long so that the vendors have more time to sell us churros or viagra.
Good luck with your mexican travels!!!

This place still seems to be a work in progress. It’s probably best to go with the most current reviews of SYPofE.
Friday, approx. 7 pm, southbound on foot:
SYPofE now looks like an airport processing center. After a very brief wait, I was told to proceed to station 6, where I was asked where I was going and for how long. They then stamped my passport, and I would have been on my merry way, except that my friend was having a more difficult time. I will play the race card here and note that, although she is an Indian Jersey girl, she could pass for Mexican. She didn’t know the exact name of the club that we were going to, and they repeatedly asked her where she was from. She had a valid passport and CA driver license. I told her boyfriend exactly where we were going, and he relayed the information. She was then afforded the privilege of entering Mexico.
It looked to me like the people walking through in the Mexican National lane weren’t given a second look. I guess that it would have been easier if she just confidently walked through on that side? Lesson learned: if you are Latino/​a or look it, be prepared to be hassled by the Man.
Saturday, approx. 2 am, northbound on foot:
My memories of this are a bit hazy. I don’t remember there being a line at all. Yes, it was faster and easier to enter the US than it was to enter Mexico. I guess that this makes up for my friend’s southbound experience, so I won’t dock them a star. This time.
Isn’t this fun? Stay tuned for further developments.
Tijuana, Te Quiero

Understand that this border crossing is one of the most crowded ones in the world. Therefore, waiting times may be long, and especially if you are sent to secondary which happens to me all the time due to my student status. (TIP!) Before you cross from Mexico check the border wait times at
to lighten the burden of getting stuck in a long line.
Even though I think there are a lot of errors in and withing the American immigration system, many of the guys here are doing their best and risking their lifes to secure the borders. And you have to understand that a certain bureaucratic system has to be followed as part of rules, and procudures.
I know as a protector of the borders you have to show authority (when needed), and be cautious with every step taken. Many officers take that too far by making the crossing experience a hell (I’ll save you the details).
However, there are also very professional ones around, some that really stand out with their patience, knowledgeability, as well as their overall approach towards travelers. Therefore, I would like to give my thumbs up to officer «PoncedeLeon”. There are one in a thousand as him I think, even though it was a short meeting during a 2.5 hour wait in the inspection area.

Busiest Land border in the WORLD, so if you are going to give bad reviews for wait time, consider flying.

Actually like 4.5 stars… We were on our way back from TJ into my beloved US of A! The line was LOOOOOONG… but no worries… we were on our motorcycles… we split lanes all the way to the front… why 4.5 stars? because one of those stupid ass vendor people who sell stuff on the mexican side, decided to push her cart into my motorcycle… and i ended up tearing my pants!!! DAMN YOU WOMAN!!! Other than that… everything was quick… CBP officer yelled at me for answering my phone, but asked me NO questions whatsoever!!!

It is, unfortunately, still unappealing to walk across the border. It’s dirty, disorderly, and incredibly congested. There is no air conditioning, no free wi-​fi, and has small narrow paths into Mexico.
If Mexico wants stronger binational relations to the US, then it really needs to invest on it’s basic infrastructure.
TIP: if you are crossing, make sure to obtain a Global Entry /​Sentri pass. You’ll shortcut the (sometimes 1 hour +) lines and past through faster.

Assaulted by a barrage of invasive questions by the first CBP officer, I joke that I am, in fact, a salmon, and since I was born in Sonoma County California (which is true), that I was journeying upstream to my place of birth to spawn and find some salmon eggs to fertilize.
Treating each person I have met as no more or less than a fellow human being has generally served me well in life, having enabled me to find friends all around the world who have all sorts of wonderful qualities that another person may not have expected them to have, due to the burden of their prejudices.
This approach has served me considerably less favorably in my dealings with law enforcement, and this instance was no exception. He chuckles misleadingly and asks the questions again. I respond seriously the second time, with an amount of detail that was proportional to the amount that his questions were inappropriate and invasive. He didn’t like that either, and became irritated when I answered his questions honestly and to the best of my abilities. There is really just no pleasing these guys.
Eventually he’d «heard enough» and tells me to pull my car into «secondary», a parking lot with more signs telling you what not to do, german shepherds tearing up the upholstery of private citizen’s vehicles, and of course fascists in blue uniforms. Having apparently learned nothing from my unfortunately numerous encounters with totalitarian law enforcement I can’t resist the urge to snap a photograph of the sign ordering me not to do exactly that. If they can record me, I ought to be able to record them, I tell my Belgian friend.
Detecting the repugnant odor of the indomitable human spirit in my tiny, harmless act of rebellion, blue uniforms quickly scuttle over and surround my vehicle. Of course they have a fucking german shepherd in a kevlar vest with them, because I’m clearly SUCH a threat (little do they know that people similar to me, only greater, will one day be the ones to hand them a pink slip, informing them that since the power of the collective human consciousness, it’s thoughts, it’s words, and it’s empathy has at long last prevailed, that their jobs are no longer necessary, and in truth never were really very important in the first place).
I assure them that I was using my phone for something else, and they assure me that even if that was true, I was probably breaking the law anyway. Taking note of the signs, I concede that what they were saying was probably true. Everything is illegal in the USSA. A portly fellow with a winning smile promptly takes me inside and bravely evaluates my buttcrack, gooch, and testicles for the state, all in front of a bedraggled young mother clinging onto three small children. The poor lady looked like she was holding back tears so as to be strong for her children. I can only imagine how long she had been there.
When I felt the portly Customs officer’s hand cup my balls, I was unable to keep silent any longer. «Do you take. pleasure, in your work, .sir» I ask him punctuated with guffaws, a smirk involuntarily plastered across my face. «I’m sorry that you would think so» he replied. I told him that I thought everybody should be able to find satisfaction in their work, regardless of how glamorous it wasn’t, and that I was sorry for him if he did not find satisfaction in his. The disenchanted, uncomfortable, angrily beet-​colored, and yet slightly melancholy look on his face following our brief exchange is an image I will cherish until the day I die, all made exponentially funnier by the context of him having cradled my testicles in the palm of his gloved hand only seconds prior.
By that point I was beginning to stand out in the gloomy chamber, though, in that it was becoming clear that I was not going to let them ruin my day, or my sense of humor, which they did not like one bit. The CBP supervisor on duty, a theoretically attractive woman made unbearably hideous by her job and uniform (oppressing other human beings is a color that flatters nobody), suddenly forgot the five or six times I’d made her laugh in the past few minutes and told me that if I wouldn’t shut the hell up she was going to throw me in a cell. I told her I didn’t give a shit what they did, and having lost count of how many times I’d been detained entering the country of my birth and citizenship, I was growing quite used to temporary confinement. She and two other blue uniforms took my answer how they wanted to take it and angrily escorted me to a beige concrete cell.
On the way to the cell, we were intercepted by not one, but two of those detective looking guys with tattoos on their forearms, button down Hawaiian shirts, and big, obnoxious leather badge laniards. They told me I was lucky that the supervisor was dealing with me, implying that they would’ve used violence to subdue my spirit. I wouldn’t swear it in court, but I’m pretty sure one of them said they’d have had me waterboarded if it were up to them.

OMG!!! 3 hours in line to make it through!!! Way slow!!!
Mientras tanto aumenté 5lbs. De todo lo que comì:
Elote, Torta de milaneza, gorditas de nata, tostilocos, etc… esperando, pero bueno igual me divertí mucho!

The busiest border crossing ever. You need to know your way around in order to avoid being stuck in a long wait to cross back into the United States.
What I usually do is cross over between 12 midnight and 2:00 AM. If you get here before amateur hour (before 2:00 AM), your wait time might be less than 20 minutes. The wait times during the day are pretty bad, usually 2.5 hours or more. In December, this can be up to 5 hours.
If you’re walking across, your wait time might be less than 10 minutes just before amateur hour. If you cross over after amateur hour, you’ll see a bunch of drunks coming back over. The ones that are too drunk to stand up on their own get sent to secondary. It’s pretty funny to watch. Crossing over during the way will set you back about 2 hours, and you’ll be under the hot sun. So night time crossing is a lot better.
Take my advise, don’t go through here during the holiday season, as you will be waiting in a long line any day and time during December.

When the line returning is short, it’s 5 stars when it’s long 2 stars. Well you can’t win them all.
First time to TJ, return to the border at around 11, long line, almost to the bridge on the side of TJ. Took as a couple of hours to get through the All Travelers line. My friend DG had a passport and I had a passport card. With the passport card, you can fall in line to a shorter ready lanes. Sentry lanes are faster too.
Second time to TJ, return to the border at around 11, where have all the lines gone. We got in to almost where the checkin for IDs are. Wait — 10 min or less.
I think they should put a camera to show when there is a line or no line, this would create a time line for those of us who either want to get over quick or spend a couple more hours drinking.
SYPOE you only get 3 stars!

I crossed the border on foot for the first time last Tuesday around 9:30am and came back around 10pm. I didn’t have to wait at all for both ways. Am I being lucky? This pleasant experience led me wanna do it again soon!

Second time in a year and first time we walked right through at 7am. This time, we were coming back to the US on Monday evening after a 3 day weekend and it took us about 2 hours. We paid $ 6 each for a shuttle to the front of the crossing area but the shuttle was held up for 1 ½ hours b/​c of the crowds. Least we didn’t have to wait standing up. We are now signing up for the passport card to get in the Ready Lane and will drive there.
If walking, I recommend looking at the UC San Diego wait time website. They also have an app for iphone.

So one time my boyfriend and I decided to see if we could get into Mexico without a passport. The employees at the mall at the border said we’d just get a slap on the wrist upon re-​entry so we thought it’d be funny.
They don’t check if you have passports or not so be careful! We thought they’d turn us away but they didn’t and you can’t turn around or anything, so that, my friends, is the story of how we became illegal immigrants INTO Mexico.
Scariest 45 minutes of my life.
We did purchase Listerine so we could park and walk around for a few minutes and it didn’t help. I forgot my seven years of Spanish and could only remember my two years of Mandarin, which is 0% helpful in Tijuana.
Fun fact: The Listerine said «Hecho en USA»
Upon re-​entry, we didn’t know which line to get into so we did the Sentri line by accident-​on-​purpose (it was the shortest line and we didn’t want to wait 2 hours). They did, in fact, slap us on the wrist. They had us get out of the car for like 20 minutes while they had drug-​sniffing dogs check the car and all that fun stuff, but we eventually made it back into ‘Murrca with no fines, no tickets, etc.
The end.

It’s always a pain in the hole to cross the border no matter if you wake up early to beat the traffic. The good or bad part is that there’s a lot of food stands so you won’t go hungry. I wonder if you could really trust their food.

4 stars for getting in and 2 stars for coming back. Mexico lets any of us over their border without checking. So that makes it real easy and quick to pop on over to their side.
Coming back… unless you have a Sentri pass be prepared to wait… and wait… and wait… zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
We have to protect our borders I understand. Doesn’t make it any easier when you have to stand in line for 2+ hours. Blarg.
Maybe I should get myself a Sentri so I will have nothing to bitch about.

Last weekend, we took a day trip down to Baja. We hadn’t traveled that way since last May but heard that the wait times on the return trip had shortened. The trip into Mx isn’t bad, the lanes are clearly marked and traffic moves pretty quickly. The return trip is a little more difficult, its very easy to miss the exit because the signs aren’t that clear and are rather confusing.
When we came last May, the wait time on the return trip was approximately 2 hours. This last week only took 30 minutes or so on a Saturday evening. This is great because it gets annoying having vendors keep trying to sell souvenirs or street food. The CBP agent that checked our documents was very sweet, personable and got us through quickly. The long wait times have prevented us from taking day trips to Mx in the past but if things keep moving as they have lately, we will definitely go back more frequently.

OK, I had a Ryan moment. I turned on my randomness feature and it gave me a lot of options: Go to Vegas, Go to Arizona, Take a Laos Angel es Trip via public transportation, but I wanted to head in the general direction of San Diego. However, I brought my passport just in case. When I stopped in Oceanside, I said, «Lets go to Tijuana!». Let’s head on over to San Ysidro Port of Entry.
This review will reflect both San Ysidro and the Mexico side. I decided to walk to the border and park on the US side. Entrance to the Mexican Border required going up and down ramps. As of 2÷22÷2014, the US side has some construction going on. Getting to Mexico is very easy and painless. There is a lot of security from the Mexican side with their rifles. There was a stoplight and people were pressing it and gave a green light. I have no idea what that was about. I pressed it anyways and gave me the green light. It was kinda cool. I want that in my room. It took just about 10 – 15 minutes to complete the process. There will be stairs and ramps for those will lots to carry. I can’t give you any details if you take your car in, but it should be fast and simple.
Now, heading back to the US. That is another story. If you frequent the US, you might want to get the SENT RI card. I’ll tell you more about that later. Expect to wait an hour or two depending on the time of day. You can be waiting long, but if you can find something to preoccupy yourself, time will fly by. There are a lot of street acts or food vendors trying to catch your attention. When you enter the US Customs & Border Protection Building, have your documents ready. As for the SENT RI Program, its a program that approves you if you pass all the US Tests. You can bypass the line and stream through and not wait for hours. However, it does come to a cost. You’ll get offers from taxi cab drivers who are approved to get you to the US side.
Make sure you use the bathroom and eat before you get in line or while in line. Just pretend the line is like waiting for a roller coaster. You’ll need your leg strength to stand up. Better yet, if you can find a portable chair in Tijuana, buy one. Sometimes, it might at a standstill and that chair will be great! It is cheaper on the other side. I have never been to Mexico on my own and this is one review you should read and BOOKMARK! Enjoy your day coming into the US or Mexico.
Do you think I write too much? Well, you can call me a Unilocal-​O-​Holic!

I’ve crossed this border my entire life.
It has grown up with me. When I was a little girl I don’t remember waiting that long and people didn’t seem as cray cray as today.
Now you have options: the regular lane, ready lane (for people with laser visas or the newest passports) and the best one «the Sentri» (a paid lane for dedicated commuters)
It seems to be a bit more organized as the years go by.
Getting to the actual border is a pain in the nutcrackers! You might have to jump a few speed bumps, go on the wrong side of the road and buy chicles from a guy who will help you cut your way through.
Prepare yourself for lots of honking, somehow people think this will speed things up… AYE! It doesn’t !!!
But it’s not all bad, while you’re waiting you can buy a cozy blanket, a Bart Simpson piggy bank, a Xolos jersey, churros, tostilocos, ice cream with chamoy, tortas, tamales, burritos and candy.
There’s plenty of stuff to stay busy, the only problem you might encounter is if you need to use the bathroom… Hold it! Hold it as much as you can.
They have just finished installing the new system with all the different scanners and lasers that are supposed to make it faster but it doesn’t seem to be as fast as they said. Mainly because people try to be sneaky and cross things that are not allowed or they don’t have the proper documentation ready.
If you bring souvenirs from Tijuana make sure it’s something that is ok to come across as there are lots of restrictions.
Ohhh you lovely border, I love you but I hate you! But I can’t quit you!
I’m blessed with my holy Sentri pass, otherwise I wouldn’t cross the border 2 – 3 times a week.
Have fun and if you do find yourself having to cross the border bring cash for snacks and an empty cup for the bare necessities of life!