For the last year or two, couchsurfing has been a big part of my travels. It’s also become a part of my life at home as people passing through share with me a piece of their lives that are normally much more interesting than my own. If you don’t know, couchsurfing is a network that allows openminded and friendly individuals to meet, especially while traveling, and often find a free place to stay. For instance, if I’m traveling to Paris then I can search for interesting couchsurfers who live there and ask if they’d like to meet or if they’re able to host me. As you might imagine, you meet some weirdos on there. Mostly, though, you just meet people who are much cooler than you.
Through the couchsurfing community, I’ve made a ton of very close friends and have crossed paths with just as many inspirational travelers. Not to mention that I’ve saved massive amounts of money by staying with fun locals and skipping on boring hotels.
After returning from SE Asia, a trip that was great but full of small disasters, I couchsurfed my way from Los Angeles to Houston in what surprisingly became one of my favorite legs of the trip. I had to get home to start work, but I wanted to do it cheaply and I wanted to stop at a couple of places along the way. To do that, I picked up my car (which I’d leased to a couchsurfer, by the way) and met up with three others from CS. One was Xueer, a Chinese girl who I’d hosted in the past. The other two were a British couple named Fen and Julia who were all around great company. My car is pretty green and with four people splitting the gas, it only cost about $40 each. Not bad!
I couldn’t have gotten much luckier with my new road trip buddies, nor our hosts. My first host was in LA. A 73-year-old jazz pianist and writer from CS lent Xueer and me his sailboat to sleep on for a few nights before we hit the road. My bedroom was the literally the size of a coffin. In the meantime, he entertained us with some jazz piano in the back of his son’s sex shop. Believe it or not, I’d never even been into a sex shop before, and never imagined it would be so nice inside. And full of variety. It was an interesting experience. Our host was fantastic and just such a good guy. Really enjoyed it there, but we eventually had to hit the road with our new British buddies.
First stop, Williams AZ. Well, we thought so. Our hosts were a young couple, the girl having recently returned from the Peace Corps. Their house was spacious, the walls decorated with notes from CSers and maps full of pins. The coolest part about the place, though, was its location. Their house was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by forest and with a view of the mountains from the balcony. No town in sight. Really an interesting place to couchsurf. The Brits made some tasty Indian food, our hosts made some tasty pizza, I ate both, we sipped on homemade wine and generally had a good time.
The next morning we headed out with yet another CSer from Australia who was being hosted there at the same time. Destination: Grand Canyon. We spent the bulk of the day walking around the canyon. I never got tired of it.
Off to Amarillo. I wasn’t really looking forward to Amarillo, a big cowboy town in North Texas. I probably wouldn’t have liked it either, if it weren’t for our amazing and bizarre hosts. Before we came, they encouraged us to grow out our beards and wear something sexually interesting. The beards were to take part in their attempt at the largest group of people in a room with monkey tails shaved into their beards. I asked why they decided to do that, and our host James responded, “I couldn’t think of a reason why not.” The clothing was for a fetish dress up party they were going to at a local bar afterwards.
We unfortunately missed the monkey tail festivities, but did see the aftermath: several men with ridiculous facial hair. We did get to the fetish party, though. It reminded me of Austin-style weird, but even weirder. The clothing, for those who were wearing clothing, was so strange. The music was nuts. The crowd was diverse. I was sandwiched between a girl from Eritrea and a cowboy wearing fishnet stockings as his shirt with the nipples cut out. It was an experience, and the fact that it was in Amarillo made it all the more bizarre. Our hosts were great and we loved it there.
We decided just before leaving Amarillo that we didn’t want to drive all the way to Houston, so I called my trusty friend in Dallas to ask if she could host us. I met her in France and hadn’t seen her in a while. She and her roommate not only obliged, but they made us a delicious couscous dinner. We all spent the night around the table and then later in the pool. The next morning we were on to Houston.
It was good to be home, but I was already thinking of the next time I’d be able to hit the road. I hosted the Brits and Xueer for a while. A couple of days later we had 4 different surfers including a really interesting and fun guy who was driving his motorcycle through 48 states. Tomorrow we’ll be joined by a group of five from Spain, etc etc and the fun never ends. It actually doesn’t get tiresome either, because I don’t host a ton of people every single day and I also let them do their own thing. It’s just nice to meet so many fascinating people living fascinating lives. It serves as a constant inspiration. Maybe it inspires a little jealousy, but it also inspires a lot of dreams.
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Nice write-up! You guys were so much fun to host!