Even though I haven’t stayed in a lot of different hostels in Sydney, I did find three fun and nice hostels. In this blog post I’m going to share those great hostels with you, telling you about the pros and cons, location, the hostel itself, and the area.
1. Beachouse Collaroy (€22,22 euros per night*)
Beachouse was the first hostel I stayed at after arriving in Sydney. I even spent two weeks here! The reason I decided to stay here, was because I booked a trip with this Dutch company called Australian Backpackers. I’ll tell you more about them in another blog post.
Pros
+ The first pro is that there are many Dutch people staying in this hostels. Many of them were working here, so they had been staying there for quite some time. Like I said, Australian Backpackers is a Dutch company, and they arrange group trips to Australia for people who don’t want to start this amazing journey in Australia by themselves. And since I am Dutch myself, I enjoyed this hostel very much.
+ There’s a busstop nearby that will bring you anywhere. I do recommend buying a bus card in case you’re traveling to Sydney and decide to stay at Beachouse.
+ There’s a beautiful beach nearby. You only have to cross the street and you’re at the beach! I would just sit there and watch the sunset. Oh, and there’s also a cute restaurant there named Sloppy Tee’s.
+ It’s a 40 minute drive by bus to get to Manly. Manly is one of my favorite places in Sydney and I have spent a lot of time there. It’s a cute town, it has a nice beach and it’s just a very fun place.
Cons
– It’s pretty far from Sydney’s city centre. You have to go to Manly by bus, and then you have to take a Ferry (this takes about 30 minutes) to get to Sydneys harbour. So it’s over an hour to get there.
– Same for Bondi Beach. If you decide to go to Australia, you should definitely make a stop at Bondi Beach. From this hostel it takes about an hour and 40 minutes to get there.
– There’s no supermarket nearby. Well, there is one but that one’s super expensive and pretty small as well. And since you’re probably a backpacker, you don’t want to spend all your money on expensive food. There is a big supermarket at Warringah Mall and this takes about 15 minutes by bus.
2. Bounce Hostel Sydney (€26,00 per night*)
When I was looking for a hostel on this app called Hostelworld, this was one of the favourites on the app. It had great reviews so I decided to try it out. I was in need of a little but of luxury (if that’s even possible while staying at a hostel). I must say that this was my favourite hostel of all three so definitely recommend this one!
Pros
+ It’s a very luxurious and fun hostel! You have everything you need and I think it’s worth the money.
+ There’s many different spots to chill, read a book or hang out with other people. On the first floor you have a lounge area with a big couch and bean bags. Same goes for the third floor and on the fifth floor you’ll have a big chill area for up to 15 people!
+ They have a room with a lot of computers, that you’re allowed to use for free! That’s a big plus for me, since I didn’t have my laptop and it’s not ideal to use your phone all the time. Sometimes you just need a bigger screen.
+ Want to print anything? You can do that for free in this hostel, but only if it’s one or two pages. If you would like to print more, you do have to pay some money. But I thought this was a great service!
+ Free earplugs in case there’s people snoring in your room. I had to deal with that, so I went to the reception and they gave me free earplugs. Lifesavers!
+ The reception was open 24-7 so you could go there anytime you want.
+ There was this big dining table. And even though the kitchen wasn’t super big, you did have enough space to sit around the table with many people.
+ There’s a big rooftop terrace where you could sit in the sun and have a lunch or read a book. In the evenings you could go there to watch the sun go down or hang out with other people.
+ This hostel would host activities every day, so it was perfect to meet other people. On Monday it was movie night, where you could get popcorn for free. On Thursday you could eat real Australian Hotdogs for only 2 dollars, and they had activities like that every day.
+ Checkout is at 10:30. In many hostels checkout time is 9 or 10.
+ It’s only fifteen minutes by train from the airport and then a five minute walk, so that’s not bad. It’s across the station but you don’t hear any of that at night.
Cons
– You do need your roomkey all the time. You have to use it to open the elevator, open your own door (which I understand) but even to open the door from the toilets.
– Compared to the size of the hostel, the kitchen is very small. It does have everything you need in there though, but it’s still small for that many people.
– Compared to the other hostels, this one is a little bit more expensive.
– When I stayed there in 2018, they were working on the road in front of the hostel. And they started constructions early in the morning, around 7 or 8. Some days it wouldn’t stop until 11 at night!
– Windows didn’t open. I don’t know what the reason is, maybe because of the fact that the station is so close to the hostel, but I really do need fresh air in a room with 8-10 people.
3. Wake up! Hostel (€23,83 per night*)
Wake up! Hostel is about a 10 minute walk away from the Bounce hostel. This one also had great reviews on Hostelworld, so I decided to give it a try.
Pros
+ You get vouchers to get a discount on activities or sometimes even free food at a few different places. I got a 25% discount on a Sealife aquarium and on a ticket to Sydney’s zoo. And you could get a 10 dollar coffee and donut at the café next to the zoo.
+ This hostel is also close to the station, which is definitely a big plus. You don’t want to walk too far with a big and heavy backpack on your back, so it’s a good thing it’s not that far from the station
+ This hostel also had a lot of different places to sit back and relax. There was a big lounge area, a kitchen and there was also a lounge area downstairs at the reception.
+ There is a travel desk at the hostel, where you can book many different activities around the city. You could use your vouchers here as well!
+ The Loka bus will stop in front of this hostel. So in case you have booked the Loka Bus, I would recommend staying at this hostel, so you won’t have to walk that far early in the morning.
+ This hostel would also arrange activities, day and night. You could do a city walk with a guide from your hostel, you could do a walking tour to Bondi Beach and more! On Monday you can get free pizza and they have a bar at the hostel, where they have different kinds of parties every night.
Cons
– It’s a real party hostel. So if you don’t like that, I wouldn’t recommend staying at Wake up! Hostel. My room was on the fifth floor, but I would still hear the loud music from the bar.
– This kitchen wasn’t very big either, compared to the size of the hostel. Not a big dining table, not many chairs and just a small kitchen in general.
– There weren’t many refrigerators to store your food. It’s a very big hostel with 8 floors, and they only had 4 refrigerators. They didn’t really think that one through.
– The rooms were pretty small, same as the lockers. We were sleeping in a room with six people but you didn’t really have enough space to store your backpack. It didn’t fit under your bed or in your locker.
What I didn’t mention was that the wifi was great in every hostel. If you had to check out but wanted to spend the day in Sydney, you could leave your luggage in the luggage room. At the end of the day you could come and pick it up, which was a great service.
That’s it for all three! Hopefully this blog is useful and you are now ready to enjoy your stay in Sydney! I bet you’ll love it there.
Want to read more blogposts about Australia? You can do so by clicking here.
Thanks for reading!
* = Prices may vary depending on the dates you’ll be staying at the hostel
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