Beds
One a night,
booked in the
right order.
Dorm beds on the five szlaki run from about €11 in Veliko Tarnovo to €70 in Amsterdam in summer. We sell none of them and take nothing from anyone who does.
How to choose one
Read the reviews from the last few months, not the average of the last ten years. Then check five things: lockers (bring a padlock), reception hours if you arrive late, the walk from the station after dark, whether the price includes the city tax, and the cancellation terms for the first nights. Women-only dorms exist in most of these cities; ask if the listing does not say.
Book the first two nights. Then stop.
Beds after night two are easier to choose from inside the country, and you do not yet know how fast you move. Everyone overestimates. You will want to stay somewhere an extra night, and you should be able to. (The exception: July and August on the coast, and Amsterdam always — book those early.)
Six beds is the floor. Ten is the ceiling.
Below six you have walked into somebody else's group. Above ten it stops being a room and becomes a corridor with beds in it, and nobody talks in a corridor.
A kitchen beats a bar.
A hostel with a working kitchen produces conversation, because cooking takes forty minutes and you cannot do it silently. A hostel with only a bar produces a queue.
Never the bed by the door. Never the one under the switch.
The door is opened forty times a night. The switch is above your head, and someone will find it at three in the morning with a phone in their mouth.
Arrive before 20:00 on your first night in a country.
Everything you get wrong — the wrong tram, the wrong banknote, the cash machine that eats the card — is cheaper in daylight and with the reception desk still open.
If the photographs have no people in them, there are no people in it.
A hostel that photographs its empty common room on a Tuesday morning is telling you what it looks like most of the time. Read the reviews from the last few months, not the last few years.
A dorm bed, city by city
| City | On | Where to stay | Dorm bed |
|---|---|---|---|
| Veliko Tarnovo | The old town (Varusha) | €11–18 | |
| Mostar | Near the old town | €12–20 | |
| Sofia | The centre, around Vitosha Boulevard | €12–20 | |
| Kraków | Stare Miasto (Old Town) or Kazimierz | €12–22 | |
| Vilnius | Senamiestis (Old Town) | €12–22 | |
| Rīga | Vecrīga (Old Town) or the Centre | €12–22 | |
| Brașov | The old town (Șchei or around Piața Sfatului) | €12–22 | |
| Košice | The Old Town | €14–22 | |
| Warszawa | Śródmieście (the centre) or Praga | €13–24 | |
| Zakopane | The centre, near Krupówki | €12–25 | |
| Tartu | The centre or Supilinn | €15–25 | |
| Budapest | District VII (Erzsébetváros) | €14–28 | |
| Tallinn | Vanalinn (Old Town) or Kalamaja | €16–28 | |
| Zagreb | Donji Grad (the Lower Town) | €18–30 | |
| Praha | Žižkov or Vinohrady | €18–30 | |
| Porto | Baixa or Bonfim | €18–30 | |
| Ljubljana | The centre or around Metelkova | €20–32 | |
| Kotor | The Old Town or Dobrota | €18–35 | |
| Sevilla | Centro, Triana or the Alameda | €18–35 | |
| Berlin | Friedrichshain, Kreuzberg or Neukölln | €20–35 | |
| Lisboa | Graça, Alfama or Bairro Alto | €20–38 | |
| Wien | Neubau or near the Hauptbahnhof | €24–40 | |
| Hamburg | St. Pauli or St. Georg | €25–40 | |
| Bruxelles | The centre or Saint-Gilles | €25–40 | |
| Bordeaux | The centre or Chartrons | €25–40 | |
| Split | Varoš or by the palace | €22–45 | |
| Helsinki | Kallio or Punavuori | €30–45 | |
| Paris | Belleville, Canal Saint-Martin or Montmartre | €30–55 | |
| Donostia | Parte Vieja (Old Town) or Gros | €30–60 | |
| Amsterdam | Oost or Noord | €35–70 |
A bed in a six-to-ten-bed dorm, low season to high, 9 Oct 2026. Our estimate from current listings, not a quote: July and August on the coast run higher.
