Couchskiing.
September 6th, 2009
I do love couch surfing. Particularly when the couch is in a ski resort. I’ve just come back from a few days couch surfing at Mt Hotham in the Victorian alps. I stayed with Olivier, a lovely French-Canadian ski instructor who had previously couch surfed with me in Melbourne (including his first ever night in Australia last year). And not only did I have a ‘free’ couch for a few nights, but because it was Olivier’s second season working as a ski instructor he got a free two-day lift pass which he very kindly gave to me. As I said, what a lovely fellow.
This isn’t my first time couchskiing. For my book Sleeping Around (which, incidentally, just won 2009 Travel Book of the Year) I couch surfed at a ski lodge in the Chilean Andes. I didn’t quite couch surf, though. It was more like bunk-bed surfing and I had 28 empty bunk beds to choose from (it was the end of the ski season and the lodge was empty). I had three marvelous days skiing at La Parva, El Colorado and Valle Nevada with nice evenings sipping beer around the open fire while my couch surfing host Miguel cooked three-course meals every night.
Mind you, when it comes to living it large in the world of couch surfing I met a French girl in Chile who hit the couch surfing jackpot. She got her very own wing in a sprawling mansion in a town in Argentina. She had sent a couch request to a host on the site and he told her to call him when she got to the town and he would pick her up. But he didn’t pick her up. His chauffeur did and he drove out of the town to this big grand mansion on a hill. A maid met her at the door and escorted her to her own private wing (with her very own lounge room overlooking the swimming pool). Dinner each night was in a huge dining room with serving staff. Not surprisingly, she didn’t want to leave.
Stupidly I didn’t get the host’s name or the name of the town. I’ve told this story to quite a few people and the first thing they ask is: ‘Where do I find him?’ Sorry, if I knew that I’d be sitting in that lounge overlooking the pool right now dictating my blog to one of the servants.