Couchsurfing as a woman

Two weeks ago, I took a little detour to Asia (more on that in the next few posts), but I’m back in the US and landed in LA a few days ago. I contacted a few Couchsurfers and this morning, I heard back from Ivan, a big sweetheart from the miniscule desert town of Helensdale, CA. He drove two hours to downtown LA to pick me up and then we were off to Big Bear, a mountain range three hours away. But alas, when do the LA traffic gods ever work in your favor?

They showered their rush hour wrath on us, so at Ivan’s suggestion, we took shelter at Knotts Berry Farm instead. I expected lots of kitsch from a “Western themed” amusement park. And kitschy it was. But not without the endearing qualities of a farm-turned-amusement-park from the 1950’s, complete with roller coasters on rickety wooden rails, and historical throwbacks like an actual 19th century school house hauled in from Iowa.

Ivan himself was another charming surprise on the Points in Between. How’s this for an interesting career twist: he’s a finance major turned security guard at a physiatric hospital. The difference between normal and not, Ivan explained, is just a little switch. The human psyche is a twisted thing, so who’s to say quitting your job is that crazy? ;)

Navigating with maps and rocks

Ivan dropped me off at a truck stop in Barstow, CA where I arranged to meet Derik, another Couchsurfer and Orange County native that I had contacted the day before. It was perfect: Derik was looking for a roadtrip and I was looking to make my way to Phoenix to catch a flight home for the holidays in a week. Our goal: to cross into Wyoming before jetting down to Phoenix before Christmas Eve. We’d hit at least five states along the way, if all went according to plan.

Within seconds of getting into his car, Derik handed me a road atlas (yes, an actual, physical map) and I knew I was in good hands. Here’s the ingenuity of the US Interstate System: you can figure out exactly where you are in the US by just looking at the interstate numbers, in case you ever run into a Wi-Fi dead zone or drop your smartphone in a rest stop toilet. (Who doesn’t know someone who has lost a phone to gravity or a questionable body of water?)

I couldn’t have chosen a better cohort: Derik just so happens to be a geology major and and in his words, rocks tell stories. By nightfall, we had experienced the epic faults of California, the canyons and gorges of Nevada and Arizona, and the mining in Utah.