Travel Journal – Couchsurfing in Verona

As I have already shared this story with you before, we had the luck or the misfortune to spend another hour in Milan, but we also had the pleasure of spending an hour in Brescia as well, a small town at the bottom of the Alps. Even though on this trip we managed to squeeze a lot of things in a short period of time, visiting a city in a single hour is a little bit ridiculous! This hour was barely enough for a coffee and some watercolors.

We eventually arrived in Verona, the city we were all looking forward to seeing, only with a 3-4 hour delay. Even so, we put our maps together and we were able to walk throughout the whole city and see everything that we had originally planned for.

If hundreds years old stories tell about travelers that had to go door to door to find a place to sleep, perhaps in a haystack, now things have changed a bit and all you need is an account on couchsurfing.com so you can look for a sofa to sleep on.
Couchsurfing is like going to sleep at a friend’s place, just that they’re not your friend yet.
Couchsurfing.com is an online network that connects thousands of people from all over the world. People who open their homes, strech their sofas and prepare guest rooms for all travelers who are interested. Even if this may sound weird, and there have been some unpleasant situations reported, this calculated risk is still worthwhile. Especially when this could turn out to be the most remarkable summer story.
This was certainly a complete experience, one of the most memorable thus far. For me, the trip in Verona was just like an Erasmus exchange, all concentrated in only one night full of surprises, without the awkward conversations or the uncomfortable moments of silence. I love to meet new people, in fact we all share this same curiosity in our group, especially when we have so much to learn from the differences of every single culture. None of us was alien to the feeling of meeting someone new, but the intercultural exchange and all the fun we had are the things that make us never say no to a new adventure. This is one of the easiest ways to make friends, who you can have some of the most interesting conversations with or from which you can learn much more than you could imagine. I really think that this is one of the most beautiful ways to truly discover a new city, a country or a culture: knowing its people.
Although there were some pessimistic scenarios floating in our minds before we met our host face to face, from the moment we shook hands and got to know each other, all negativity went away. So, the same day we arrived in Buttapietra – 10-15km from downtown Verona, at Matteo’s home, where we partied how we knew best.

The whole evening unfolded as a night out between friends, having a glass of wine or a bottle of beer, playing some table football, inaugurating the new pool, having a few shot and eating homemade pasta, all in this order. We should have went to sleep before 3AM, considering that we had to catch a train in the morning, but our hearts wouldn’t let us.

We might all probably find an extra place to sleep in our own house, whether it’s a sofa, an extra bed or even a sleeping bag. Why waste the extra space?

I think that whatever you do in life you need a little bit of luck, and this experience was no exception. Regardless of how cautious we would have been, I must admit that we were lucky to find Matteo, who treated us like his good friends. We wouldn’t have made so many memories if we hadn’t met him.

Thank you for your hospitality!