Is AirBnB the new Tinder?

I've been busy preparing for my trip to Australia these past few days, including booking accommodation.  I'll have a weekend in Sydney, and because the hotels are mega expensive and I'd like to be within walking distance of most things, I decided to save my company some money and go the AirBnB route instead.  I booked a room in the heart of Sydney with a friendly American who had excellent reviews.


We exchanged a few messages through the site, and then he asked if I had Whatsapp.  I do, and I thought "Oh yeah, that could be useful if I have any trouble getting from the airport to his place", so I sent him a message.  That message has now turned into daily messages from him, and I'm starting to get a little bit nervous.

His texts have been really flirty, asking what I plan to do for fun in Sydney, if I like to go out, do I want to do a wine tasting with him, etc. I've been trying to emphasize I'm coming for work and will need to detox over the weekend, so no partying etc, but he just won't give up. Yesterday morning's message was "I know all the best hikes in the area with wine tastings at the end".

So today I went back into his AirBnB profile to read a bit further.  I'd already read the first few pages of reviews before booking, and they were overwhelmingly positive. A lot of them mentioned things like dinners out or having breakfast with him on his balcony.  Then I went back and read his profile again, and saw at the bottom that he says he's a Tinder expert (so much so that he has even written a book on it!).  And 90% of the reviews on his page were left by women, which is also odd - you normally don't see many women staying with a solo man on AirBnB.

All of that plus the messages he has been sending me has me now wondering - are the kids nowadays using AirBnB to hookup?  Are there secret clues in his profile I should have been aware of?  I mean, I guess I can definitely see the appeal for the hosts - you meet people from all around the world, have sex AND get paid.

Or I'm reading too much into this, and he's just bored and being a nice guy, which is why he has such good reviews.  What do you guys think?

A mon avis....

You are reading WAY too much into this.

This guy sounds sketchy, watch out for roofies.

Girl, it's not your money - you should be staying at a hotel!

Sage Quotes

Either way, I wasn't planning on bringing the pocket taser I bought for India to Australia, but maybe I will just in case lol.

Greece

Continuing on with the anniversary theme, C & I will be celebrating our 5th wedding anniversary shortly.  And because he starts his masters program next week and I'll be leaving for Australia, we decided to get out of dodge and take our anniversary trip a few weeks early.

We spent a fantastic week exploring the Cyclades, a chain of islands off the coast of Greece.  Normally I enjoy trip planning, but I was in the midst of a major travel spree when we booked this trip and the though of having to plan one more itinerary - even a fun one - put me over the edge.  So we booked a trip through Promovacances that included all the transport, boats, hotels and breakfast, and I'm so glad we did.

Our trip had a great combo of culture - including two stopovers in Athens:

Day trips to several different islands, including Santorini and Mykonos:

One of my favorite day trips was to Delos, which is basically one big ancient excavated city that you can run and explore as you please (there's basically no shade on the whole island though, so bring your sunscreen and a hat!):

And then we had a day puttering around the islands on a local boat:

We just cruised around and stopped off every hour or two to swim in these gorgeous turquoise waters:

And they still left plenty of time for relaxing on the beach or just wandering the beautiful streets:

We were based on one island the whole time (Paros), which was nice since we didn't have to pack up and go each night. I'd definitely recommend staying there for future trips - it's a fairly large island with good boat connections, and it's also much more affordable both hotel and food-wise than Santorini or Mykonos.  It took about 5 hours to get there by boat from Athens (but you can also fly in), and it was about 2h by boat to Santorini and 1h to Mykonos/Delos.

I think as far as Athens goes, one day would be enough (and it's worth it to by the city pass that covers all of the sites). We walked everywhere, so we didn't use the metro at all, but it is apparently affordable easy to use.  The one thing that surprised me about Athens was how cheap it was - both hotels and food were much cheaper there than in the islands.  C and I often grab food at bakeries or grocery stores for lunch when we travel, and both days we were there, I got a large freshly blended juice and a sandwich for under 4€!  Not bad for a capital city.  Though if the number of boarded-up stores give any idea, it's just an indication of how much the mainland is still suffering after their economic crisis.  (It seemed to be pretty much business as usual out in the islands.)

Has anyone else out there been to Greece?  If so, where did you go and what did you think?

13 years

I can't believe it - I missed my own Franciversary.  Thirteen whole years in this crazy country...

I know thirteen is normally an unlucky number, but I'm currently feeling really positive about this next year.  There are a lot of potentially exciting opportunities coming up with my company, and my travel schedule is continuing to be a whirlwind.  I just got back from back-to-back trips to Russia & Greece, and drum roll please...I'll be going to Australia at the end of the month, with a potential stop-over in Kuala Lumpur for a conference. How cool is that?  (The 28-33 hours of travel time on the other hand is decidedly less cool...)

I'm also feeling more positive about juggling all of that with C's impending studies - mainly thanks to all the encouraging comments and messages from all of you. It kind of reminds me of when I went through my big Breton break-up - for as difficult as it was, it helped me immensely to know that so many others had gone through equally hard times and had come out happier on the other side. So yeah - bring it on 13, show me what you've got!