10 sits (Just finished my last of the year and now happily home for the holidays.)
2 countries (U.S. and U.K. I’m American.)
126 days (One host had an accident and returned early.)
6 dogs (Did a repeat sit for 2 of those dogs.)
6 cats
My sit locations:
San Francisco
Leavenworth, Washington, in the U.S.
Seattle
Fulbourn — just outside of Cambridge, in the U.K.
San Diego, California
San Diego
London
Stratford-upon-Avon, U.K.
Long Beach, California
Glasgow, Scotland
Fun facts:
My first U.K. sit let me fulfill a daydream to live in a British village.
I take my sit dogs sightseeing if they’re in good health and their humans are cool with it, when I have time away from telecommuting in their homes. For example, the pooches have hung with me at historic pubs; ridden hop on, hop off tour buses; taken boat and ferry rides; visited historic cemeteries; watched community events like dragon boat racing and Indian new year’s celebrations.
My biggest surprise was how attached you can get to new furry friends even after only a week or two.
Thanks to THS, my hosts and sit pets for many lovely adventures and memories.
I have sits booked for 2024, though I don’t book far ahead. Cheers!
This is a fantastic topic, and we’d love to hear from our members about their year, so I’ve pinned it so that we can give your post some extra visibility.
Really hoping to see more Forum members sharing their adventures from 2023!
Mine are absolutely 0. Partly because I’ve had a busy year but also for a good part because most of the ones I’m intetested in go to reviewing while I’m having a little think and checking location and travel costs etc
So much fun….
2023 has seen sits in….
Switzerland
Germany
Holland
Belgium
Portugal
Thailand
Sri Lanka
Turkey
Estimating 12 ish THS sits total
9 months of the year guesstimate on sits
A lot of flights
Plenty of FlixBus
Many many Tuk tuks
36 animals wins the max for one special sit
Dogs, cats, chickens, quail, cockatiels, conures, giant tortoises, bearded dragon & fish in the mix along the journey
One golden tree snake in the shower
One cobra in the garden
One scorpion in the pool
Soooo much adventure!!
Here’s to 2024 fellow THS
2023 for us was unusual since we had to stay “local” for the year for medical reasons though we started our year in Spain and Portugal (7th year of full-time travelling).
Three things I do quickly if I’m curious about a sit:
Google flights. Like X city to X city. This can give you a snapshot within a minute.
Search Google Images for X city. If it’s got good stuff, it will pull up photos within a minute.
Google “best things to do in X city.” I find it easy to skim and tell whether there’s enough.
I also have a prewritten application msg that I customize for relevance.
All the above means I can apply for a sit within about 10 minutes. I just did it for a sit I got an alert about (a saved search). And I know that city well, so I looked up only airfares.
Wow, that was an interesting exercise adding them all up! Given we fell into this I am really surprised how many sits we have had from January 1st 2023 -December 31st 2023. We also have 10 sits booked for 2024 taking us to mid October with a few weeks spare here and there!
23 sits
3 countries(England, Scotland, Wales) sitting
4 countries (Hungary, Austria, Czech Republic &
Germany) not sitting (mostly eating & drinking )
268 nights sitting
27 nights in hotels
5 nights with family
65 nights at home
45 dogs (many repeats. Biggest group = 6) plus
our own dog at each sit
1 Koi pond & 1 fish tank
Wishing everyone happy holidays and a fantastic new year with more great sits to come.
I’m an HO and part-time sitter. Not all of these were on THS. One of the best things about THS for me are the friendships established and opportunities broadened. I don’t know how to make a bulleted list.
9 sits
4 countries - USA (Washington DC and Florida); UK (Manchester, Marlow, London); France (Geneva suburb and near Carcassonne); Panama (Panama City).
110 days.
I was gone from home a total of 6.5 months, had one sitter for 3 months, another for two months, another for a month and one for 3 weeks.
Currently I’m back taking care of two small dogs that I first sat for in a French suburb of Geneva in the spring. Their ‘mom’ bought a house near Carcassonne and this is where I’m spending the holidays.
Thought I’d share this little infographic I made for our year in review blog.
We did 22 sits in total across six countries. Bought and sold a car in New Zealand, did a 2500km road trip around NZ, spent 3 free months in London, and rented a flat in the south of France for a month. Finishing the year looking after two cats in Athens.
Not sure how many total days spent sitting, but it’s a data point I’d be interested in looking up.
Joined in November 22 as a homeowner. Able to get a sitter quickly for a Thanksgiving trip. Finally, combined membership in June 23 – I was feeling down and wanted to do solo trips as me time, but my spouse wound up accompanying me on most.
Berkshires in MA – Jamey the hunter brought us a bird. No worries! We freed the bird and he flew off.
Portland Oregon – 3 lovely cats, including one who was happy to share a bed with me. Plus the city of food trucks, big trees, and Powell’s Books!
Berkshires II – No birds from Jamey, but fresh from the garden veggies from the homeowner and comps from a neighbor to see his show!
Boston – A great weekend to explore Cambridge, Sommerville, Medford and Boston. A comfy apartment to come back with two amazing but very different cats.
Stanton VA – Blue Ridge mountain hikes, historical homes. If you go, take the architectural walking tour! A big house with a guest suite larger than our apartment. Deer in the morning. Two fine cats – indoor only, not door darters because as our host said, "They know they have a good thing!
Honesdale PA – Home of the first steam locomotive to run on commercial tracks in the US. Probably better known to some of us as the home of Highlights Magazine for kids – still in business btw. There were going to be two cats and that sounded like fun, but then the HO let me know they’d had a foster fail so now there was kitten too!
Upcoming: San Fransisco in 2024!
It’s great, but when I come home from a sit, my cats always look at me like they KNOW I’ve been seeing other cats!
I started on THS in August 2023 thus far I’ve had a combination of cat sits and mini holidays in between sits. It’s been a good year.
140 days
9 countries
7 sits (2023)
4 flights
5 trains
4 buses
Barcelona Spain (holiday)
Montpellier France
Munich Germany x2 (same family)
Catania Sicily (holiday)
Turkey (holiday - Istanbul & Antalya)
Geneve Switzerland
Amsterdam Netherlands (holiday)
Edinburgh Scotland (holiday)
Glasgow Scotland
York England
London England x2
Bath England (2024)
Manchester England (2024)
I hadn’t broke it down to the calendar year until now. I had it on my time of leaving the US so this is interesting.
2023
15 sits-3 were repeats
218 days sitting
16 dogs
13 cats
10 Koi fish
4 Chickens
1 Blue tongued lizard
6 Countries
Spain
New Zealand
Greece
UK(England and Jersey)
Germany
Ireland
We started out 2023 on an island in the Mediterranean and are ending up on an island in the Mediterranean.
Sits were;
near Palma, Mallorca, Spain
Hamilton, New Zealand
Paraparaumu Beach New Zealand
Rotorua, New Zealand
Waikanae, New Zealand
A tiny village on the Greek Island of Crete called Choumeri
Twice for the same people on the island of Jersey, UK
Koblenz, Germany
Aachen, Germany
Cambridge, UK
Greenwich, UK(near London)
Muswell Hill, UK (near London)
Bray, Ireland (just south of Dublin)
And now we’re on a repeat sit back on the island of Crete.
In between all those sits, we squeezed in a 21 day western Mediterranean cruise, a vacation in the Philippines, stopping over a few days twice in Sydney, a quick stop through the US(Montana, California, Missouri), and a vacation to Macedonia and Albania.
It’s been a fun and thrilling year with THS being a huge part! We’re looking forward to another awesome year in 2024 with 7 sits keeping us busy until mid July!
)
(holiday)
