If you’ve dismissed hostels as exclusively for the single, young, party-hearty sort, you may wish to reconsider.
Some hostels have private rooms for families, rather than the dorm-style accommodations that singles use, and you sure can’t beat the price.
I’m going to start poking my head into hostels when I travel, to check them out on the Kid-Friendly Scale, but meantime here’s a great BootsnAll article by Jennifer Miller:
Hosteling with Kids: Benefits and Tips.
Why hostels? From Jennifer’s article:
“Finding lodging for families while traveling can be a real challenge. The more children you have, the bigger the challenge and the more expensive it gets. If you’ve got kids and you haven’t tried hosteling with them, give it a try; it’s fun, it’s easy and there are lots of benefits over the traditional hotel stay. Among them, it’s generally cheaper. At $15-20 a bed per night our family of six can stay for an average of $100 a night in a hostel. Try finding two hotel rooms that adjoin for that price!”
Let us know about your own hostel experiences in the comments: recommended places, and places that may seem family-friendly but don’t work out so well in reality.
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{ 4 comments }
This is an interesting post. I haven’t personally encountered any families with kids staying in hostels, but given that most of them have private rooms as well it seems like a good opportunity. If the objective is to save money, a cheap hotel may be a better option for that many people though, particularly in Europe.
Hostels can be great, but they also can be a VERY expensive option for small families….certainly in Europe. We’ve stayed in luxury hotels that cost us less than hostels!
We’ve been traveling the world as a family, non-stop since 2006 and travel and live large on just 23 dollars a day per person, but we almost never stay at hostels. We have enjoyed the ones we’ve tried, but they were costly and are never are first choice.
So make sure you compare prices.
I’ve loved staying in hostels with my kids.
Although I enjoy a good hotel as much as anyone, there are some vacations – notably those with children – that I actually prefer a hostel for. I’ve never tried the ones in Europe, so it could be they’re more expensive. But as a single mom traveling with kids, I appreciate the sense of security I’ve had staying in hostels, has which many cheap hotels just can’t offer.
In our experience, hostels can be a good budget choice. We’ve found there’s a more relaxed atmosphere in hostels, and camping out in a hostel room all together is more fun than feeling cramped in one hotel room, because in the kids’ minds, the point of a hostel is kind of like roughing it, while in a hotel, they expect more luxury and are more – not less – likely to complain. (Who’s going to fight over the TV channel when there’s no TV?). And in many of the hostel family rooms we’ve stayed in, there are actually enough bunk beds that every kid can get a top bunk! Can’t beat that, can you?
Hi Jess, thanks for visiting!
Hi soultravelers3, appreciate your experienced input.
Hi Mitzimi, thanks for the feedback (and yes, top bunks for all = WIN!)
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