Camping together - advice from weekend 1-ers?

[antimony121]

Hi - I was at Coachella 2010 with only one car, this year we have 3 cars to camp and probably can't arrive until Thursday around 10pm. I'm sure we'll have to wait in line forever but can anyone give advice on how to camp next to one another? Is it best to get in the same line (one behind the other) or adjacent lines and hope the security gets you through at about the same time? Did anyone else arrive this late on Thursday who might be able to give me an approximate wait time? Thanks!

[Andrew 619]

They have a group meet up spot this year

[christianlewis024]

They have a group meet up spot this year

really? where? is it a place to pull off to the side and wait for your group to be in line?

[heyeric]

really? where? is it a place to pull off to the side and wait for your group to be in line?

ya right after the checkpoint

[aphrael]

they made it work this year.

you go through the search booths, go left and north a bit into lot 10. right when you get into lot 10, over on the left side, is a pullout area where you can wait.

they try to enforce a short-term waiting rule, but it's half-hearted. i waited for an hour for the entire group to arrive - two of us got in a very slow line.

[iamellyn]

It was so awesome to have a space set aside! It made it so much easier to keep our group together. You can't miss the waiting area.

[Majour]

Wait time on THU night was about 1 hour in security check lines...if all your party members are present, try and line up in the same row for the first checkpoint to make it easy, since some vehicles may be inspected longer than others and there might be cars trying to cut in-between lines.

Also, whenever possible, try and have your window rolled down and kindly tell security that you and however many cars behind you are "together".

Once you pass the car check and head to the toll gates, do the same and again let them know who is together in your camp group. If you do get separated when they release you from the toll gates, you can wait temporarily in the "group meet up spot" next to Lot 10 or pull into the lane to the right of the cones just after turning left.

Bottom line is don't be douchy around security and they'll prob be flexible in return.

[antimony121]

May I ask what time you arrived on Thursday to only wait an hour? We can't get there until about 11pm on Thursday so I'm worried we won't make it through the line by 2am.

[CaseSensitive]

They were so accommodating last weekend in regards to camping together. We got there at 11:30 on Friday and there was NO wait and they didn't even search our car, we took nothing out. Just got lucky.

[Majour]

@antimony121

It was about 1045-1100pm or so. I'd expect a 1 to 2 hour wait max. and wouldn't arrive any time past midnight, since I think the close it down @2am (somebody can verify this)

[aphrael]

May I ask what time you arrived on Thursday to only wait an hour? We can't get there until about 11pm on Thursday so I'm worried we won't make it through the line by 2am.

we arrived around 2 in the afternoon. i was through security by 2.30. my friend in the other line took another hour.

[Inthecolumbiagorge]

We were so happy to see the group waiting area for the 10 cars in our group! When we went through security they were going through 2 cars at a time in each row so we parked 5 cars in one row and 5 cars in the row next to it and we all got through security within 15 minutes of each other and we all parked together, no problem at all. Thanks to GV for fixing this issue and it was the best thing to happen to car camping at Coachella!