A Very Meshy Christmas
After moving away from Boston and across the country over the summer, this was the first Christmas we’ve spent away from family. We decided to take the opportunity to embark on a little adventure. We knew we wanted some snow, it just wouldn’t feel like Christmas to us without it, so I hopped on Airbnb.com and looked at some of the spots San Francisco locals always talk about – South Lake Tahoe and Yosemite National Park. Both are under 4 hours away from the city, so when I found some awesome accommodations on Airbnb.com, I emailed a few folks and figured out what the availability was like. We were looking for a handful of things: Great location, good price, Dog friendly (a must!), Fireplace – there is nothing better when there is snow on the ground to hover around a crackling fire
Many places were already booked, but we found a spot called the Old Yosemite Cabin that was open through the holiday. Airbnb.com made it easy to find places that met our criteria and then book the place right on their website. It turns out Yosemite is a pretty amazing place, and this was an epic Christmas trip! Some of the highlights included hiking around the Giant Sequoias, viewing El Capitan & Half Dome, cooking a Christmas Bolognese, and going for a horse drawn sleigh ride.
There was also quite a bit of relaxing by the fire, where I started Lisa Gansky’s new book, The Mesh. It’s all about businesses that are based on sharing, like Airbnb.com for instance. This is a business model based on people sharing their personal space. Zipcar is mentioned in the book as a business about sharing cars in a community. The book highly resonates with me, because I’ve spent the last few years thinking about Service Networking and how to connect people to share their time, skill, and expertise. It’s an interesting moment in time, what people are calling the “Sharing Economy“. The technology wasn’t available 5 years ago to do what we are doing today – leveraging social, location, and mobile to create a really powerful network. It’s exciting to think of all the possibilities and power that lye with a Mesh network – where the community is what drive the business.
So here I am, feet kicked up, enjoying the fire in our Airbnb.com cabin, thinking about Service Networking, and reading about The Mesh. If only we had used a Zipcar to get out there. Good stuff!
I am excited to try Airbnb.com again during our travels. Kobe was not allowed inside the Sequoia Grove, so we’ll definitely have to go back in the spring to explore Yosemite some more. The winter was fun with all the snow, but some roads were closed, and I bet the summer months boast their own magic.
December 30th, 2010 at 3:11 am
You’ll have to use a getaround car on your next adventure