Trem Bão de Dormir Hostel

The place was very clean and had all the amenities I needed. Venancio was a friendly, attentive host. It's in an exceptional spot, just three blocks from the beach in one of Recife's most popular and safest tourist neighborhoods. There's also a small market two blocks away with different food options at night. I definitely recommend it.

We couldn't stay at the accommodation, so I can't say more about it. After I booked a room for my boyfriend and me on Booking.com, the host asked us to pay double. They were rude and completely unwilling to accommodate us, and seemed unaware of Booking.com's terms, which say a provider can't raise the price after the reservation has been made and paid for. I've never experienced anything like it. Because of this dishonest host, we had to find somewhere else to stay at our own expense. Stay away!!!!

I volunteered at this hostel and had one of the worst experiences of my life. The place was completely disorganized and toxic. One guest, who had serious symptoms of depression, spent days eating in bed, shut in a dirty, dark room that smelled extremely bad. Even so, the owner, Venâncio, expected volunteers to cater to her demands, like keeping absolute silence and total darkness, which is completely out of place in a hostel. When I challenged unreasonable orders, I was humiliated, threatened, and thrown out without any dignity. The owner kept mixing personal problems with running the hostel. He shouted, hit tables, and created an atmosphere of fear and emotional insecurity for everyone around him. I was left alone with nowhere to go and treated as if I could simply be discarded. Women especially, be careful. This place is hostile, degrading, and not safe at all. Please avoid it as much as possible.

It's hard to rate this hostel. The infrastructure is okay, simple and without luxuries, which is what you'd expect from a hostel. The staff are kind and helpful, and it's a good location, about an 8-minute walk to the Boa Viagem waterfront. Some bad and strange things had a big effect on the stay. The bathroom smelled really bad, probably from the drain or the faucet trap, and I didn't like that the women's bathroom couldn't be locked. One night, there wasn't a single staff member at the hostel. A new guest with a reservation arrived around 11:30 p.m. for one night, but no one was there to let him in. The other guests, me included, found the gate's padlock key and let him in. He had a car, so we opened the gate for him to park. That same night, we needed to turn on the air conditioning, but the remote didn't work. One guest had to go out to the street and figure out that the AC breaker was off. We closed the whole hostel ourselves and slept with the gate unlocked in case a volunteer staff member came back in the middle of the night, since he didn't have a key. He only returned in the morning. The guest who'd arrived by car left earlier, and had to get a contact from me so he could arrange payment for his stay. It all felt confusing and unsafe. The price is okay, but you should know it's pretty disorganized and run freestyle. I won't stay here when I come back to Recife. Unfortunately.