Lodge In The City

I’d tell people to stay away. In less than two weeks, I’ve had repeated problems with both the building and management. Three days after moving in, the door scanner started running out of battery and locked me out. The managers didn’t answer when I asked for help. I had to contact them again the next day, and twice they said someone was coming to fix it, but nobody showed. On the third day someone finally came and changed the batteries, but they were taken from a random box, not a new pack. Less than a week later, they were running out again. I asked about ending my lease early because management was so unreliable. They told me to email, which I did, and a week later I still hadn’t heard back. There was mold on the windowsill when I moved in, only one light worked, and clothes I put on the shelf came back with yellow dust stains because rooms aren’t cleaned after tenants leave. The kitchen is revolting: all the fridges smell of rotting food, and they clearly aren’t cleaned out. Finding clean dishes is difficult, if there are any at all. The dryer on my floor was broken for a week. Toilet seats are broken and constantly covered in piss. There’s one hand dryer in the bathroom, right beside a sink, so you can’t use it when someone is standing there. Every part of the building smells weird. In the common area, someone is always blasting the TV or people are drinking, and birds get in there too. There’s a reception desk, but I’ve never seen anyone at it. The location gets four stars because it’s a five-minute walk from cuba street, but that hasn’t made the stay worthwhile. UPDATE: The second-floor dryer has been broken since I posted this, and the elevator has now been out for a week. Someone on the third floor uses a walking stick, which makes the lack of a repair especially egregious. STAY AWAY FROM HERE

The people staying here are nice, and it has a bit of rustic charm. It’s cheap, and honestly not as bad as a lot of the other reviews make it sound. In some ways I like it more than Nomads, in others it’s a little worse. The hallways smell a bit unsettling, parts of the floor are wet for no clear reason, and the elevator and many toilets are out of order. It could be really nice if a new owner spent some money sprucing it up. For a budget stay, if you can get a four-bed dorm for around 10 euros on booking.com, I think it’s worth it. There’s a chance the dorm won’t be full, which could mean a fairly restful night.

The location is very convenient, easily a five out of five. Parking, though, is a nightmare. Don’t bring a van unless you’re good at backing out of tight spaces. We paid $106 for a small twin room. It was old, but just clean enough, and the reception staff were nice. The kitchen was okay. I’ve stayed in worse hostels. The bathrooms need renovating, and while the shower pressure and temperature were decent, the ventilation was terrible. I’m fine with unisex bathrooms, though I understand others might be uncomfortable. It has potential to improve, and it was okay for two nights.

The kitchen was fairly clean at first glance, but only on the surface. We saw the shared spaces vacuumed, yet nothing was wiped down, and food dropped on the tables in the morning was still there that evening. We stayed in a triple room with the kids. It looked relatively clean until you noticed the damp, slightly sticky carpet and filthy windowsill. Each floor had 30 rooms sharing just two toilets and two showers. My main issue was the showers: there was rubbish in the stalls, and they felt dirty.