Yes, it's the time of the year again. The Intrepid Home Swappers are at it again: we now have a schedule and two partners for about 7 weeks in Europe. How else could you afford it if not by exchanging homes and cars?
I have to admit this planning season was painstakingly slow. Nothing happening for weeks: I wrote to dozens of members on our website, well a site that we use and who gave us a two year membership for free because of the disaster on the houseboat last July. (Scroll down and you can read up on it if you haven't yet!)

The first positive answer came in and made us very happy: my favorite location in the south of Germany, der Bodensee.

To give you an idea if you're not that familiar with German geography:The lake and north of it is in Germany, to the east is Austria and to the south is Switzerland. We'll be near Ueberlingen...if you squint enough , you can just make it out above the word Germany in red. So in Austria and Switzerland, you'll have the famous Alps around it.

You can't tell much from a map, therefore your for enjoyment and interest a real photo of what to expect:

That's more like it, isn't it?
Our exchange partner just wrote me that they are flying to the British Virgin islands today for some sailing. I can't say if it is a home swap, but home exchangers do get around; most of them have the traveling bug!

So we had one exchange and I waited for more for several weeks.Nothing doing. I even signed up with another site to have more places to choose from. They, I have to say, were not very responsive and if there was an answer, it was a NO.
My preference would have been to go to Italy or France for a change. In my experience, however, these folks don't often reply. Neither are they interested in coming to Florida. We were about to give up hope when, out of the blue, an offer came in from Amsterdam.  So we gladly grabbed that, a very nice family btw. We skyped immediately. No dillydallying with them. One more email and they booked their flights and signed the agreement

I often compare home swapping to internet dating. Either there is some connection and interest or there isn't. Sometimes you have to wait, but you must give it a try. Just sitting at home will get you nowhere. So more about Amsterdam at a later stage.
I never finished last year's report. Just back from a trip to Maui and of course I had to write about that: http://www.shewrites.com/profiles/blogs/i-ve-fallen-in-love-with-maui
Hawaii has 46 members on our home swap site as well.I wrote to about two dozens suggesting a trip from one paradise to the next.But no takers so far.