The Post

Lorna Thornber

Couchsurfi­ng virgin finds that sometimes you get what you don’t pay for.

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There’s a saying that if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. But the prospect of three free nights in a US apartment in Santa Monica seemed too good to pass up.

So I popped my Couchsurfi­ng cherry and arranged a stay via the free accommodat­ion website with Jacob: A 27-year-old IT specialist who proclaimed to be an ‘‘open’’ and ‘‘dynamic’’ advanced yogi, aspiring surfer and regular hiker keen to show off his city – downtown Los Angeles’ beach-mad hipster little sister – to visitors.

With phone and address details verified by the site and 15 out of 18 positive reviews, Jacob and his couch seemed much more enticing than a US$40-a-night hostel bunk or Airbnb bed that would have destroyed my dreams of eating out at at least one prime celeb-spotting restaurant.

The three negative reviews didn’t give much away. One merely said the guest ‘‘had a strange feeling’’ about her host.

Despite Jacob’s friendly messages before my arrival, I couldn’t shake my own strange feeling that the accommodat­ion would fall through or he’d turn out to be some kind of psycho. This was LA after all.

So, when my Uber pulled up outside his apartment building, I was relieved to find it was clean, bright and even kind of coollookin­g (in a retro suburban California kind of way) and just a few blocks from the beach.

I was somewhat unnerved when Jacob answered the door topless but, eager to find a logical explanatio­n, put it down to the fierce mid-summer sun and the fact my early arrival may have driven him from his bed.

He was as friendly in real life as he was online, offering me a foam mattress in his spare bedroom instead of the living room couch. The catch: I’d have to share it with his long-term couchsurfe­r, a young Polish woman with an under-the-counter waitressin­g gig and, as really seemed to be the case with so many there, stars in her eyes.

While she was out most nights making the most of the legendary LA nightlife, Jacob and I whiled away the hours on his very comfy couch, half-watching episodes of Californic­ation as we sipped kir cocktails made with Napa Valley chardonnay, and discussed everything from his take on Los Angelites – ‘‘people stop talking to you at parties the moment they find out you’re not in the movie business’’ – to the familial ties behind his planned pilgrimage to Israel.

But, as is perhaps inevitable when two strangers from two different worlds spend a night together (no matter how innocent the circumstan­ces), things got a little weird.

It began when he admitted, unabashedl­y, that his main motivation for hosting is to have cute foreign girls cook and clean for him for free. Sadly for him, I’m far from a domestic goddess and, somewhat fearful things might turn ugly, told him as much.

But he was typically nonplussed, saying he also enjoys deep-and-meaningful­s with people from different background­s; exchanging ideas on how to get ahead in this hectic world of ours.

He gave me a few suggestion­s on how to have the kind of workhard-play-harder-buy-more lifestyle he seemed to enjoy, advising me to swap journalism for more lucrative technical writing, preferably for my own company. Money, in his view, really is the master key to happiness.

A big draw of Couchsurfi­ng for many is the chance to hang out with a local, and get the inside info on off-the-radar things to see and do.

Jacob had offered a tour of the city in his convertibl­e and a hike in the mountains but, as my stay was midweek, he had to work and I was left alone. Which suited me just fine. I was more than happy to bus or get a taxi to the spots I especially wanted to see (the architectu­ral marvel that is the Getty Museum and celeb hangout Malibu) and simply have a nosy. Strolling around Santa Monica, I took him up on his restaurant recommenda­tions, enjoying the best poke (a Hawaiian raw fish salad as ubiquitous as hamburgers in health-mad LA) I’d ever had.

And it was nice, after a long day of exploring, to come home to a place which, while clearly a bachelor pad, actually felt like a home. To spend time with a fellow lover of travel and the outdoors who, while infuriatin­g at times, made me re-examine my life choices.

One of the best things about sites like Couchsurfi­ng is that they show there’s a whole world of people out there willing to welcome fellow travellers into their homes and lives purely to give back to the travel community. My time at Jacob’s mightn’t have been perfect but it did allow me three free days in a city I probably wouldn’t have been able to afford to stay in otherwise.

Watching the sun set behind Santa Monica pier one evening, a quote from Californic­ation antihero Hank Moody came to mind. ‘‘I like it here, it’s nice. The sun is chirping, the birds are shining, the water’s wet. Life is good sweetheart, life is good.’’

 ?? PHOTO: CARLO ALLEGRI PHOTO: LORNA THORNBER ?? A big draw of Couchsurfi­ng for many is the chance to hang out with a local, and get the inside info on off-the-radar things to see and do. It may not be perfect but Couchsurfi­ng is a boon for travellers on a tight budget.
PHOTO: CARLO ALLEGRI PHOTO: LORNA THORNBER A big draw of Couchsurfi­ng for many is the chance to hang out with a local, and get the inside info on off-the-radar things to see and do. It may not be perfect but Couchsurfi­ng is a boon for travellers on a tight budget.

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