Home exchange experience:

Sharing activities

It would be too extensive to describe the hundreds of good experiences that I had with all my families. Doing a home exchange can be a dream, and here are some examples:

In Colorado Springs, I arrived at about 11am to my guest family. At 12 we had lunch and when the lunch was finished she came to me and said: “JP, I love the spirit of your trip, I trust you, here is the key of my US$ 80,000.00 convertible, just have fun during your stay in my house”. It was a limited edition convertible car, just 200 cars like this in the world! Oh! By the way, it’s impressive how a nice convertible can catch the eye of women while driving on the streets!

In Charlotte it was the same experience but with a convertible Jaguar. I really enjoyed the architecture of the house I lived in, but also the experience I had with my guest family who made me visit their second home along the lake. From the boat, in the garage, we left for a nice trip around the lake.

In Cleveland, the parents of my guest family were passionate about sailing and they invited me on their sail boat for a cruise on Lake Michigan.

In Saint Louis, my guest family was incredibly nice; the man was passionate about motor cycles and Harley Davidsons. He asked me if I already had bike. I answered him that I didn’t even know how to drive a motorcycle. So he taught me in about five minutes, then asks me to do two laps in his garden until he told me: "that's ok, you are doing pretty well! I’ll lend you my motorcycle, you can go for a ride!" So I went on a road lost in the middle of the corn fields where there was no big danger since there were no cars. I had an incredibly nice time. The second day, he came with me. He also knew that I wanted to ride, so he called one of his friends who have some horses and I went riding with them through the forest and corn fields.

In Oklahoma City I went to a baseball game with my guest family. In Columbia, my guest family invited me to jet ski with them. In Charlotte I went rafting. In Minneapolis I went camping with my guest family and their friend. We also went to the Dave Matthews concert together.

In Las Vegas, I sat beside my host at a professional poker table in a casino and he explained his strategy to play poker to me. He was a very good player!

In Miami, my guest a family took me along the coast in their boat.

I enjoyed playing softball with Jeff (a student who welcomed me in Seattle) and all his friends in a park in front of the Seattle bay.


I also had personal tours of public and private institutions all around the country.

In Boston I had a personal tour of Harvard University by the son of my guest family who had just graduated. The other son was a tour guide at the Boston Red Socks stadium and he also gave me a special tour there. I also had a private tour at the state capitol by a state representative and thanks to him I went inside the governor’s office.

In Minneapolis, I had a private tour of General Mills and the Best Buy Headquarters. In New York I visited the S.O.M. Company, one of the most famous architectural companies in the world. I also visited the World Trade Center Memorial offices thanks to my guest family who was the assistant director.

I don’t know if it was because I’m French but people thought I was very concerned about food. Most of my families invited me to the best restaurants of their towns. I ate in more than 100 restaurants during the 80 days and about 60 were certainly among the best of each place!