i had a nice time in belgrade....i had fun...and hostel was ok...for the hostel...but the people are very friendly...and kind...and i felt like at home...and hostel is in the center of the city...so tet is very good thing...if i ever go again to belgrade...i will visit this hostel again...fore sure...

Where to begin? Terribly unfriendly owner who flipped out at me due to an error in the reservation and refused to give me my money back, because he had already spent it. He angrily hung up the phone and refused to talk to me.

"Smoking on patio only" meant that guests and staff were free to smoke anywhere inside the hostel. The place reeks.

The night time guy left to go partying, then came back in the early morning hours. When other people arrived to check in, I had to let them in.

Pushy daytime staff; I was appalled at the blatant and hate-filled anti-American and anti-Albanian rhetoric one of them spewed. Plus, said person got insulted and gets pissy when you don't follow her sightseeing plans or just mention that you didn't particularly like a certain attraction.

Avoid. At. All. Costs. It's just not worth the headache and hole in your pocketbook.

I have mixed feelings about Downtown Hostel, and I have mixed feelings about Belgrade. I can find many faults with both, but we've had such a great time there that it's difficult to separate these impressions. First off, Downtown is not for people who care about cleanliness, spotlessness and comfort. Although nothing is really dirty, and our room and bathroom were cleaned on a daily basis, the whole huge apartment adapted for hostel purposes is in such a sad condition that it would probably never pass muster anywhere else in Europe. The pictures of the hostel posted on the Internet have little to do with reality, especially the picture of a double room which was nowhere to be found in the hostel. We booked it, in fact, but were given an old dormitory room in which only the two of us slept, so we had the otherwise shared bathroom to ourselves. The linen and towels were clean, but the mattresses on the beds were full of dust. There was only one single bulb to illuminate the whole room. No wardrobe closets, nowhere to put your stuff but the other dusty beds in the room. The view from the window was the only redeeming factor in the room.

To counterbalance all these negative accommodation aspects, there was the management of the hostel, in particular the two middle-aged women whom the owner employs to supervise the place, prepare breakfast in the morning, and clean up. They made us feel unebelievably welcome and at home, and we had some very interesting and long chats. Serbian people are known for their hospitality and accessibility, and we encountered this everywhere in Belgrade.

The position of the hostel is also excellent, especially for guests arriving by train or bus, but also with regard to the action going on in downtown Belgrade, which is only a 10-minute walk away. It feels longer than that because you have to climb a hill, and the roads are pretty steep, but we only used public transportation on one occasion - everything else we found to be within walking distance.

Belgrade is a huge, sprawling city with over 2 million people, and it's also incredibly dirty. I don't think I've seen as much garbage, dirt, and dog poop on the streets in any other European city. The infrastructure is also very poorly maintained, especially the pavement walks, in which there are holes, cracks and crevices literally every step of the way. The buildings need repairs, and many of them are ugly edifices from the Communist era which only contribute to this decrepit image of the city.

Again, despite all this, Belgrade is THE city to have fun in. There are literally hundreds of bars and clubs for people of every age, many of them uniquely decorated and attracting a very diversified crowd. The city especially comes to life in the warmer months, when river barges on the Sava and Danube rivers open up for nightly events. Culturally, there are several interesting museums to visit in which entrance is either free or ridiculously cheap. In general, prices in Serbia are incredibly low, you can dine out twice a day and paint the town red for relatively little money.

I would recommend visiting Belgrade to young people who'll be able to make the most of it. Turistically, there's not that much to see, and after you're done with the obligatory sights, there's plenty of time and opportunity to just have fun. As far as accommodation is concerned, dozens of new hostels have been opened in Belgrade within the last year, so I'm sure people could fare better in those than we've done in Downtown Hostel, but again, the only real fault that can be found with it is the poor state it's in.

Had a great time - Belgrade rocks! The hostel is totally laid-back and a great place to chill out, and the staff was really friendly. I'll be back.......

Nick, USA, stayed on 19th Oct 07