It was a bit loud and a bit of a hike from the tube, but all in all, a decent enough place to stay. They breakdown breakfast very early.


Better for a group of kids, I wouldn't stay here again, though.

My boyfriend and I left NZ to live in Ireland...we had a holiday in Thailand first and were going to stay with friends for the night when we reached London but unfortunately it wasn't timed right. So shortly before we left Thailand and were due to arrive in London we frantically searched around websites for a decent but cheap place to stay. Unfortunately we didn't know anything about this website or lastminute etc so we just booked what we were able to get at such short notice. We originally had booked Astor Kensington - good area and it looked like a really nice hostel.

We went there once we arrived in London - was quite a mission when you're carrying around big packs and you're sunburnt and jetlagged but we managed to find the place....to find out that the website we had booked with had double booked the one room so there wasn't anywhere for us to stay.....

They organised the Astor hostel at Leinster Inn and a "free upgrade" so we had a room with a shower included. We were kinda pissed off but wasn't much we could do about. So found our way to Astor Leinster Inn - bit of a mission wandering around Leinster Square to find it! Not exactly that easy...found it eventually and it's basically a dump...... We had a "free upgrade" but we still paid 50 pounds for the night which is a rip-off! and it really hurt us since with the exchange rate it was $150 NZD!!

Our room had a very uncomfortable bed, springs in it and majorly sagged...our shower was literally a cubicle next to the bed...it was handy i guess but not exactly ideal. The toilet was across the corridor, down some stairs - definitely not ideal! Just one toilet. Only managed to sleep because hadn't slept in the past two days and was absolutely exhausted otherwise I definitely wouldn't have got an ounce of sleep...The hostel was incredibly loud - you hear every single footstep, doors slamming and the floor actually shakes with the amount of noise.

You can get decent deals/offers for not paying much more in price and you'll get a 4 star hotel so if you can avoid it - DO NOT STAY AT THIS HOSTEL!

This hostel is ONE TOTAL SCAM!
I wouldn't recommend anyone staying here.
One (not one toiletblock consisting of more toilets), just ONE toilet for a whole corridor (which would be about 15 dorms!!!)
And 2 showers of which of one had a broken lock, so none would use it anyway.
A single room charges 55 euro's, which is a ridiculous price for a room with a broken window (freezing at night if you're unlucky!), a completely worn through matrass and a bed with a bottom of some iron bars.
Oh and remember, if you've paid ahead for several nights & you do decide you don't like it (which is very likely) after the first night, there's no refunding since they need to know you're cancelling 24 hours ahead.
I was completely dissapointed in this place. I've done loads of travelling around the globe and I know that even a 'cheaper' place can be welcoming, clean and good.
I checked out at 01.00 in the morning to stay at the hotel of the next doors neighboor, which was even more expensive (worked one year to save up for trips like this!) but the friendliness and hospitality of the owner was a relief after the Astor's.

This was the first hostel that I stayed at on my European tour...
I cried when I arrived.

But after a 27 hour flight and never having stayed in a hostel before I decided to: loosen up, give it a go and use the "chin up and bear it" attitude.

After having now spent the better part of 2 months traipsing all over Europe and completely lowering all preconcieved opinions of hostel accomodation, I still find this to be the worst hostel that I stayed in, bar one.

The toilets, and there werent many on the floor that we stayed on, were grotty (there is no other word to describe them) and the showers (although they had good pressure and temperature at 5am in the morning when we used them) were few and far between. However, the beds were reasonably clean (you could tell that they wash the sheets) and comfortable for me.

We stayed there for 5 nights and found that it was a great hostel as far as location was concerned (frankly its only saving grace)... but I would not recommend it for the first time traveller or for those that want to see everything during the day and hope to occaisionally retire to a quiet lounge on the odd evening.

This is the place that has halls that smell of cigarette smoke, questionable drunken behaviour, bus loads of school kids arriving at midnight... I could honestly go on, but mostly I could sum it all up with the statement that the establishment does not encourage a respect for your fellow boarders - never a night that we werent woken by the people in our room.

All in all, I have to say that the advice supplied by other reviewers so far has been fairly accurate and unfortunately hasnt changed - you get what you pay for here. If you really are on a tight budget, try looking somewhere else first, worst case dont stay here by yourself, you need to make sure that there is someone with you that you can suffer with...