Post in 50s+ Travellers

Hi Faz

May be one day they will ...mais peut-être pas!

Guilty as charged - our junk-filled spare room in our compact unit would require a major project to clear a space for even one person to comfortably sleep and open a suitcase. We couchsurfed between 2010 and 2017 in the US, Canada, England, Japan, and France, and I had a wonderful time - though my Cindy was stressed, feeling pressed to cook in strangers' kitchens - especially for an impromptu party of 20 people she wasn't told about. I'm also remembering Louis in Cambridge, England, who told me he wouldn't travel, but enjoyed offering his available space to travellers who brought the world to him. Some folk were like that - had spare space, but were not able to travel.

In general, knowing we were saving on hotel costs, we tended to buy lots of treats for our hosts, so they often ended up thanking us for going above and beyond expectations. I'd love to couchsurf again, but time has passed; Cindy felt stressed about it, so we haven't ...

One of my first happy memories of CS was meeting young women from New Zealand in Sydney. I think the lovely Elaine came first as a friend of the CS requestor, and I spent the day showing her around Sydney CBD, and shouted her lunch at a favourite Japanese soba/udon place. She expressed amazement when I told her I knew the restaurant designer (I think Philip knows Mariko), who had told me it was 1980s yatai (Fukuoka street-stall-on-wheels) themed, played 1980s Japanese pop songs, and said she would never have found such a place by herself. The next day we took them to a workmate's Brazilian-themed BBQ in the suburbs, and they were dancing in the garden. Ah, wonderful memories !

Many Couchsurfers do not or cannot host due to practical life constraints such as living arrangements (small apartments, roommates, location, or living with family), demanding work or school schedules, privacy concerns, and negative past experiences. Others experience platform burnout or use the app strictly to meet up or travel themselves.

Even without opening their homes, non-hosting Couchsurfers keep the spirit of the platform alive through cultural exchange, local knowledge, and community building.

People who travel don't live in squalor; they have the means to buy plane tickets that cost the same as rent in Europe. We need to stop giving them excuses not to make an effort on their part. Everyone's has 2m² for a air mattress to host for one night and make CouchSurfing great again

While I have surfed in the past — mostly while younger and healthier — hosting is my main travel exchange choice. I currently have two lovely guests — neither through CS — and as old and broken as I now am, they're making my life easier.

I did try to surf when I briefly went to Colombia, but got not one response and expect that will probably be the case when/if I'm able to travel in the future.

So, finding ground-floor hostels will be what I look for now. (I'm going to Mindo in a week and a half and that's where I'll be staying.)

Yes Karen, I understand. That's why many people post photos where they look younger than they actually are.

We just hosted a longstanding CS vegan Kiwi in his 30s who doesn’t drive, who works four months a year, and who then travels the world with a very light footprint. I wouldn’t expect him to be a host, but he was a thoroughly engaging guest. For me, CS isn’t about tit for tat. The cultural exchange is what makes it worthwhile.

We communally bemoaned the new site; he didn’t go through official channels to make a request, instead simply starting a chat which we used to connect with getting him here. Somehow he’s left us a reference as well today, and I’m grinding my teeth trying to respond to his latest message because the website won’t let me scroll down to type a reply. Eventually it will, but in the meantime I’m twiddling my thumbs. I really can’t stand this website.

Coushurfing remains an alternative accommodation site; cultural exchanges can take place online, we can cultivate ourselves in many different ways, but hospitality can only happen in real life.

Couchsurfing thrives on human connection, not transactional bookkeeping. Treating the platform as a strict "zero-sum" system overlooks the diverse life stages of travelers, many of whom cannot host today, such as students living with their parents, but may pay that generosity forward years later.

​True reciprocity within this community is rarely a direct 1:1 exchange of beds; it is an exchange of trust, culture, and mutual respect. When I first joined Couchsurfing and had no track record, I built trust from the ground up by organizing local gatherings at my home and opening my doors to host travelers before ever asking to be hosted myself.

Cultivating references, engaging genuinely, and reading profiles with nuance will always matter far more than demanding an immediate balance sheet.

This is not about transactions at all. I want one single community of people who both host and are hosted — not two separate groups: travelers on one side and hosts on the other.