Home swapping is the new Airbnb alternative

Amy Froelich and her wife, Marla, have been Airbnb hosts since 2015. They started in Iowa City, Iowa, and continued on to Madison, Wis., where they own a four-bedroom home in a lush neighborhood within walking distance of trails and shops. On weeks that their house isn’t rented out, they open it up for free home swaps through HomeExchange — an online travel hack they stumbled onto that lets them leverage their place for free accommodations elsewhere.

”We were just in a home exchange outside of Glasgow, Scotland. This beautiful couple, Claire and Michael, greeted us at the door with homemade bread that she’d just pulled out of the oven,” says Froelich. The hosts couldn’t vacate on the agreed dates, but they offered the couple a loft area with a master bedroom and en suite bath. In exchange, they’ll get to stay at the Froelichs’ home at a future date of their choosing. “It’s much more than monetary value,” says Froelich. “We departed as lifelong friends.”

Bloomberg News

Racing down the Dune Climb, a 300-foot sand dune, is one of the more popular activities in a corner of Michigan known as Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. Kids gallop and roll down, their squeals as high-pitched as the cries of the herring gulls overhead. At the bottom you’re sweaty and breathless — but awaiting you is shimmering, sapphire-blue Lake Michigan, endless as an ocean. Just be ready for the oxygen-sucking, slipping-and-sliding clamber back uphill.

New York Times

Thousands took to the streets of Barcelona last weekend to protest overtourism, some armed with brightly colored water pistols that sent bewildered visitors fleeing restaurant patios, abandoning half-eaten meals. The protesters, who carried signs reading, “Tourists go home,” say tourism has inflated the cost of living for Barcelonians, while the revenue from visitors hasn’t been fairly distributed across the city. The frustration in Spain reflects growing backlash against overtourism around the world. Led by the Neighborhood Assembly for Tourism Degrowth, the protesters listed 13 demands in a manifesto, including restrictions on tourist accommodations, fewer cruise terminals in the city’s port and an end to tourism advertisements using public funds.

Washington Post

Americans left the country more this spring than they did before the pandemic, according to new passenger volume data released by the National Travel and Tourism Office. The data found that more than 8 million Americans left in April 2024 to travel internationally, an 8% increase from April 2023 and 106.3% higher than in April 2019. Of the departures made in April, 38.5% left for Mexico, while 20.2% went to Europe. Canada is receiving an increase in popularity, with 12.9% growth in visitation from Americans compared with April 2023. Travel observers have seen an increased desire for international travel among Americans since the pandemic ended, and confidence once again grew for travel as a whole.

TravelPulse