![[Lake scene drawing]](http://images.midwestweekend.com/graphics/lake_scene.gif)
In winter, only the most dedicated pilgrims make the trip to Itasca, Minnesota's most revered state park.
Yet the park is beautiful without its forest canopy. It's easy to see its bones, the lumpy quilt of knobs and kettles laid down by retreating glaciers. It's easy to see the 300-year-old pines that escaped loggers. And it's easier to listen — to the sassy chatter of a squirrel, the prehistoric croak of a crow, the rat-a-tat of a woodpecker.
In winter, the park grooms 32 kilometers of trails for classic and skate skiing. On the trails, skiers see the legacy of Jacob Brower, the far-sighted surveyor who, in 1891, used his own salary to start piecing together the state's first state park.
Apparently, hotels are so 20th century.
These days, people are staying anywhere but. They’re renting vacation homes through VRBO and HomeAway. They’re house-sitting at Caretaker.org. They’re staying for free at HomeExchange.com, Servas.org and Couchsurfing.org.
Now, we have Airbnb.com, whose slogan is “Travel like a human.’’
To get a bargain on lodgings, you can try Priceline or Hotwire. You can clip coupons or use AAA or AARP discounts.
You can try every angle, but a single traveler still won’t find a bed that’s cheaper than those at hostels.
Many Americans think hostels are used only by college-age backpackers in Europe. That’s how most of us discover them. My first stay, at a hostel in the heart of London, was memorable: I made friends with two other college kids, and we celebrated my 19th birthday by going out for fish and chips and then to the theater. As we walked home, Prince Phillip and the Queen Mother drove by.
Until recently, my memories of college dorms mostly involved sloppy drunks, sloppier roommates and a bathroom shared by the whole floor.
Then my husband and I stayed at Marquette University in Milwaukee. It was as quiet as a cathedral, and we had a private bath and a panoramic view of the city from our 17th-floor picture windows.
We paid $28 apiece, which was nice because we like to save money. But mostly, we stayed at Marquette because it was so
convenient, three blocks from the special bus that takes summer visitors to the lakefront Henry Maier Festival Park and right
on the route that takes baseball fans to Miller Park on game days.
In the age of the Internet, house exchanging has grown up.
In 1991, still the era of snail mail and high-priced international phone calls, I wanted to exchange my home for one in Europe. But few people wanted to come to Minnesota. Finally, I found a family in southern Sweden, and we went there for three weeks in July. In July, Sweden is practically deserted because everyone is vacationing in Spain and Italy. It drizzles nearly every day.
Since then, the world has opened up. Everything happens on the Internet, including home exchanges. When I type in “Minnesota’’ on the HomeExchange web site, I find 10 families who want to come here. They’re offering a beach condo in Venice, Fla; a ski chalet in British Columbia; a flat in Barcelona; a bungalow in Ireland; a waterfront home in Sydney, Australia; and homes in Philadelphia, New Hampshire and California.
