San Diego Airport to Tijuana
Mexico has no signs, or as the locals put it, “él que tiene boca, llega a Roma.” Literally, this means “he who has a mouth arrives in Rome”. In other words, you have to somebody for directions or know where you’re going ahead of time.
This means that I spent almost an hour looking up how to get from the San Diego International Airport to the Mexican border and on to a family wedding using only public transportation so that I can avoid a rental car and I ended up just asking the bride who is Mexican, but who commutes to work in San Diego.
The airport is only a few miles north of the international border and can be used as a transit point for travelers wishing to visit Tijuana. You can take public transportation from the San Diego airport all the way to downtown Tijuana and it will only cost you $10. You go outside the airport and take the airport express bus, which is route 992. Buy a $5 day pass from the bus driver, which will also cover the trolley. Take this bus to the first stop on Broadway. From here, you should see the American Plaza Trolley station. Walk over to the west side, and you will catch the Blue Line to San Ysidro. The day pass you bought from the bus driver will work on the train, which could help you to catch a train that’s just arriving at the American Plaza Trolley station. The San Ysidro exit is the last stop on the Blue Line. Everyone will get off the train. Follow everyone across the bridge to the right of the trains. You cross the freeway on the pedestrian bridge by going up, across and back down. Go through a one-way gate, go straight, and either cross straight through another one-way gate or go right after the first one-way gate. Going straight will take you to the closer but more expensive yellow taxis driven by taxi drivers in yellow shirts. The fare for these taxis is $5 USD to revolution avenue. If you go to the right after the first one-way gate instead of going through the second one-way gate you will be directed towards a small market and here you can catch the lower-priced taxis which are usually green and white and called either “Taxi Libre” or “Taxi Economico.” These cost $3 USD to get downtown.
If it’s during the day then you can just walk to downtown instead of taking a taxi. Follow any signs you do find that say to Centro. You’ll walk across a long bridge, and generally head toward the Revolution Arch.
From there we’ll take a bus to another hotel and then a shuttle from the hotel to the wedding itself. Thankfully I have like 5 hours to figure all of this out on the ground and get changed and beautiful for the wedding. Now I just have to figure out what to wear for a traditional Mexican wedding and weekend in San Diego with just carry-ons. I’m definitely not taking a full-sized rolly-bag suitcase rolling across the border.
