Hôme Backpacker's hostel - in Valencia

I mentioned in an earlier post that we stayed our first night in Valencia at Hôme Backpacker's hostel in the older area of the centre known as the Barrio del Carmen. It was a stopgap, as our main hotel, Hôme Deluxe Rooms was full for the Saturday night, and I thought it would be good to stay one night in the centre.

We arrived from the airport at about 9pm and the multilingual staff were very nice, gave us our sheets and towels and pointed us to our family room on the third floor. The hostel is in an old building tacked on to a church and overlooked a square. An artistic eye had been at work in the decor with bright colours and patterns painted everywhere. I wished that the English youth hostels could be a bit more like this rather than the typical magnolia walls and flowery curtains.

Our room was a bightly coloured but otherwise simple with large lockers, sleeping 6 people in 3 sets of bunk beds. On the ground floor there was a sitting area and on the third floor a large kitchen which was equally bright and modern. Plenty of travellers in their 20s were wandering about, cooking or making use of the free WiFi. There was an open terrace on the same floor and on the roof was a much larger roof terrace where they hold paella demonstrations at the weekend.


The guy on reception was very helpful and recommended us several different places nearby where we could go to get a bite to eat - see my previous post if you're feeling hungry. I also had an in depth conversation with him about my camera as he used to work in a techie gadget shop and told me it was a pretty good one (we bought it second hand from e-bay).


To give you a feel of the place, I came across one girl in a bikini in the communal bathroom - whether she was just back from the beach or about to go out on the town I couldn't tell. Another had her mobile glued to her ear as she put on her make-up while phoning her friends to find out where the best party in town was likely to be.

The Barrio del Carmen is the place to be for nightlife in Valencia and around 10pm it starts buzzing with bars and nightclubs going on until dawn. We had the full benefit as we tried to get to sleep and at 1am the party was still going strong in the square below our window.

Would I stay here again? Definitely if I was in my 20s, on a tight budget and valued a great nightlife over a good night's sleep - sadly those days have gone.

Hôme Backpacker's hostel, Plaza Vincenta Iborra, Barrio del Carmen, Valencia

See all my Valencia hotel photos on my Flickr site here.