One way to cut costs while traveling can be staying with friends or relatives that live near by your destination. But what if none of your friends live within reasonable distance, or you’d rather not stay with your crazy aunt with all the cats? You still have a choice to crash on a couch for free if you’re willing to try a new trend called couch surfing.
As the website couchsurfing.com states, “couch surfing is a worldwide network for making connections between travelers and the local communities they visit.” Travelers can log in to this non-profit website and create a profile, much like Facebook or Myspace where they can fill out information about themselves, add pictures and find friends. Then they can search for people hosting “couch surfers” in the area they plan to travel and find people with common interests that they may want to stay with. Their FAQ has helpful answers to questions regarding safety other planning details.
With over a million users around the world, you can find a place to crash almost anywhere. It has been a discussion I’ve heard multiple times in different classrooms at UMass, and their testimonials have always been positive. There are also similar networks to Couch Surfing as Sally Howard from Times Online suggests in her article The Top 5 couchsurfing websites.
Not only are accommodations free, but you get an insider look at the culture, find out the hot spots from locals, and make friends you may have not otherwise made. By being open minded and adventurous there is a lot more to get out of traveling than some may think.
