Sue and Jacks Home Exchange Experience

Home Exchange in Australia

Up we get at 5am to miss the Sydney traffic and arrive six hours later at our house swap destination having stopped a couple of times for coffee.

The house was easy to find after good directions from the owners. They also advised us to go shopping for food first as the house was 20 kilometers from anywhere.

It was a large mud brick house with verandas all around. We were welcomed by an enormous cat who told us it was feeding time - except it wasn't (this is probably why it was fat).On the table was a welcome letter and a bottle of wine - how lovely and then the exciting time of looking around the house and the boys choosing their bedrooms. Although this was our tenth house swap experience, it still seems strange when you arrive in someone elses house and look through all the kitchen cupboards to find where things are. Then it was really funny at dinner time when Simon poured peppercorns on his steak expecting it to be ground pepper and Gavin poured sugar thinking it was salt. We all had a good laugh.

Sandra and John have a spacious four bedroom mud-brick home, two separate living areas one at each end of the house, which meant our boys could watch their own TV - this made for a very peaceful holiday, which is always appreciated. The view from the house was magnificent; looking the mountains and a glimpse of the sea. There were also cows and donkeys in the adjoining neighbors land.

The garden was beautiful with many fruit trees and vegetables growing and so many varieties of birds to watch and feed. A pair of swallows clearly told us that they did not want us eating our breakfast on the veranda so close to their nest.

We found plenty to do even though it rained quite a bit. Fishing is also very popular in this region and whales visit this coastline in October. Our boys enjoyed enjoyed the Magic Mountain Fun Park while we just loved the scenic drives and lovely little towns, galleries and searched out great little coffee shops.

So after a stressful time living and working in Sydney this was a perfect holiday getting away from it all.

When we finally arrived home my house was lovely and clean and there was nothing to be done. What more could you ask of a holiday. There is no other way to go - house swaps for holidays. Our holidays are so much easier, we have all the facilities we need, more choice, the boys don't get bored and we save so much money or rather we are able to do more because we save on accommodation. Now we can't wait to see where we can swap next !

Sue and Jack, Sydney, Australia