Does your idea of a perfect holiday have to include the comforts and certainty of a well rated hotel? If so, look away now!
The travel networks below may not offer the same levels of creature comfort as traditional holiday accommodation, but they do add adventure and new connections, enabling you to meet and stay with locals all over the world, for free. And as well as slashing the costs of your trip, they help lower the environmental impacts of travel.
What unites the members of these (non-profit) organisations is a sense of generosity, kindness, open mindedness and trust in strangers – all values that align with the Share and Repair family (imho!).
Servas
Servas is a network of members spanning more than 100 countries. Travellers can stay with hosts for 2 nights absolutely free – no money changes hands, though it is always nice to reciprocate in some way (offering to prepare a meal, providing a drink, or otherwise helping in some way).
Rather than just using the free facilities provided by the host, Servas is all about connecting with local people on your journey, getting to know them and promoting peace, trust and tolerance in the process. In my 30+ years of travelling and hosting with Servas, this trust and generosity has always held true.
Staying with a host does not need to be reciprocal – you can be a Servas traveller without ever being a host. However hosting can be very rewarding too, meeting new people and making interesting connections in the course of daily life, while ‘passing it forward’.
Welcome To My Garden
Welcome To My Garden (WTMG) currently has 7,600 members offering free camping in their gardens for slow travellers – this means you must arrive on foot or by bicycle, not by motorised transport.
Gardens are spread far and wide across Europe, but the scheme started in Belgium, with a concentration of members there and in the Netherlands.
In WTMG I have encountered a warm-hearted community of citizens. And like Servas, you don’t have to offer to host others in your garden in order to use the network as a traveller. If you do have a suitable garden though, hosting is an easy and friendly way to welcome and meet slow travellers passing through.
Warmshowers
Another network promising free accommodation is Warmshowers: this is specifically for the cycle touring community, and members are encouraged to offer to host others as well as to use the service as a traveller, connecting via the Warmshowers online platform.
Warmshowers is now truly global, growing over the last 10+ years to a community of more than 185,000 users. While I haven’t yet used Warmshowers myself, the anecdotal feedback I’ve heard from others has been nothing but enthusiastic.
Couchsurfing
Couchsurfing is a global community connecting you with a global network of people willing to share their homes and enrich your journey.
Couchsurfing qualifies for inclusion in this article by simple dint of its scale, with 14 million members in 200,000 cities. I have no personal experience of it, though I have heard feedback that member responses to requests to stay can be sketchy, which may be difficult when you’re trying to plan a journey.
So, what are you waiting for?
The physical accommodation you will find using these member networks will range from the palatial to the basic. But if luxury is not your top priority, they offer the promise of local connections and experiences served up with warmth and friendship – not to mention being completely free, bar the very low membership fees.
If you’d like to know more, ask me anytime on a Wednesday in the shop.
Volunteer Newsletter article on alternative travel accommodation, written by Bill.
