Swapping Homes? Pack Clothes to Suit the Climate

Phew - what a scorcher! The sun is sure shining down on Britain this week, with high temperature records broken yesterday in the South East. Fortunately, I don't generally need to travel into central London during peak times but yesterday, even travelling mid day when it's not so crowded, the Tube felt like a sauna. The older Underground lines are so deep that it seems to be taking forever for engineers to figure out ways of cooling the trains to bring some relief to long suffering commuters in our increasingly hot summers.

I was sure glad to get back home as, although our Edwardian house, like most in London, is not air conditioned, there are places (like the old stone floor in the hall) which are pleasantly cool even in such extremes of heat. As air conditioning is not all that common in hotels here, it is certainly one advantage of home exchange to be able to spread out over a whole house or flat (often with a garden), to find the coolest places to relax, rather than being confined to a small, hot hotel room, especially when travelling with children.

People often seem to have the idea that it's always raining and cool in the UK (even some of my Canadian friends and relatives do!) and I have this vision of many visitors arriving at Heathrow and Gatwick this week with suitcases full of heavy clothes and rain gear. The best plan, for a visit to Britain in the summer, is to pack light, comfortable clothes that can be easily layered according to the temperature.

Wherever you arrange a home swap, ask your exchange partners for advice on the most suitable clothes to bring. If you develop a really good relationship with your exchange partners you might even agree to the use of certain items of clothing to save having to pack something like a heavy jacket 'just in case'. This is exactly what happened when Jan, a New Zealander, exchanged with Londoner, Triona. Having an overlap in New Zealand at the beginning of the exchange (always a nice idea) gave Jan and Triona the chance to get to know each other. Jan recalled:

'Triona admired my shoes and I noticed that we were both a small size 3. I said "if there's anything in my wardrobe you need - help yourself". She told me to use her jackets and coats in London if I needed them.'