is absolutely astounding.
I envisioned couchsurfing across Europe; we ended up hostelling and hoteling. (We did surf a few times though, and hosts generously drove us to the train station/lent us bikes/gave up their beds for us). I then envisioned us couchsurfing across North America, and instead, we ended up staying with so many generous blog friends. Not to mention the many others who took the time to show us around, take us out to eat, or put together adorable goody bags/welcome packs for us.
We also miss your pets! We’ve met so many awesome dogs along the way, which was such an eye-opener for me; to date, almost all the dogs I’ve ever encountered back home are outside dogs that belong to, erm, Westie trash types and fall into one or more of the following categories: dirty/mangy/loud/ill-behaved/scary. By contrast, I now know that clean, housetrained, inside dogs DO exist.
I think it was a little weird for T, but he quickly got used to the idea that we’d be meeting semi-strangers in almost every city we visited. There was Manda in DC, Sandy in Massachussetts, Asian Pear / Save Spend Splurge in Toronto, Windy City Gal in Chicago, Athena / Funny About Money in Phoenix, Revanche / Untemplater / Financial Samurai in SF, Tiny Apartment / Erika / Stacking Pennies / Tonya in LA. I can’t forget Lesley in Iceland (formerly of 23toLife.com), either, plus we narrowly missed a few others along the way (so close!): Leslie, Amber, Daisy, Katie, Stephanie (I’m really hoping I haven’t forgotten anyone! Eek!)
I can’t thank you guys enough, and hopefully we’ll be able to return one day to relive the magic. It’s probably going to be quite awhile before we leave NZ again though … so, come see us soon. Okay?