Home Exchange

We were away on a trip to Europe for awhile and it was a lot of fun but now we are happy to be home. The monsoon season has finally arrived in the Tucson area. For the last couple of years, the monsoon has not been as spectacular as in previous years. There is not as much rainfall either. Maybe this is another sign of global warming.

We were in Belgium on a home exchange for a few weeks at end of May and in June, and really enjoyed the trip. For us, a home exchange is really a good way to travel. You get to see how the natives live in real daily life, with shopping and cooking, and also usually get to know the town and the neighbors very well in a longer stay. A house is much more comfortable than a hotel room, and is very convenient, especially for a casual breakfast before heading out on the day’s adventures. My husband and I have been exchanging for about four years now and we really recommend it. We haven’t had a bad experience and typically the homes are even nicer than their writeups describe. And the visitors are careful about your home too because they understand the situation. Last week a couple of Swiss women came to stay at our house. We are hoping to visit them next summer. They promise us a great time and already have an agenda made up for us. Nearer term, we have arranged to visit Australia and New Zealand (four cities and four home exchanges!) towards the end of this year. We are finding that sunny Arizona attracts people who want a mild winter, and we have had many offers from various parts of Canada. This interests us and we have to make the time to visit the Great White North.

The summer months in Southern Arizona doesn’t bother us. We simply schedule our activities to avoid being outside mid-afternoon. Most of our visitors come to our Tucson area in the winter or spring. So we were really surprised when the Swiss women emailed us for an exchange in July. We warned them about the heat, and they said they could handle it because they had been to Thailand several times, and it is very hot and humid there. Well they did handle it very well and said it is nowhere near as humid as Thailand was. One advantage for them visiting in July is that there are numerous restaurant and museum discounts in the summer because of the relative lack of tourists. So they had a very nice trip here, and really liked seeing the town and meeting us. We liked them too and took them around for several of their days here.

We were glad that they did not mind the temperature when they were here, and they spent a lot of time sunbathing by our community pool. They said the Swiss crave the sun. Now, the Swiss have gone home, our son is back at college, our daughter has a new job and is on her own. So we are back to our normal routine, doing things early in the morning, staying indoors during the heat of the day, enjoying our occasional siesta, and arranging to do things with our friends in the evening when it is much cooler, maybe even 30 degrees cooler. There is no lack of special events and social life in the Tucson area in the summer time. So don’t stay away from our city just because it is summer. There are still plenty to do; your simply need to adjust your daily schedule.