My best travel week ever was in a $18 hostel in Lisbon

Last spring I booked a week at this tiny hostel in the Alfama district for 18 bucks a night. The place had no AC, shared bathrooms, and the owner gave us free port wine every evening. Made friends with a guy from Australia who showed me a secret viewpoint that wasn't on any map. Has anyone else had a cheap hostel turn into a way better experience than a hotel?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_oliver28d agoTop Commenter

Yeah @eva_ward88, different luck for me I guess. My 18 dollar joint in Alfama was legit.

eva_ward8828d ago

Ugh, I totally disagree with this whole romanticizing cheap hostels thing. I had the exact opposite experience in Lisbon last year. Paid 15 bucks a night for a place that looked like a converted broom closet, and I got bed bugs for my trouble. The "free port wine" was basically rubbing alcohol mixed with grape juice, and the secret viewpoint the Aussie showed me was just a dirty rooftop overlooking a parking lot. Hotels might be boring, but at least I can trust the pillow doesn't have someone else's hair on it and the shower actually has hot water for more than 2 minutes. Sometimes 18 dollars just means you're paying to suffer, not to have a "charming" experience.

calebw5028d ago

Wait, didn't you go looking for the cheapest possible bed in Lisbon and get exactly what you paid for? Bed bugs are nasty and all, but 15 bucks is basically the price of a sandwich these days, not a guarantee of clean sheets.