I have always used HostelWorld.com to find the best fitting place to stay. On my trip to London in November 2006 we stayed at The Globetrotter Inn. Recently a good friend who is planning her honeymoon escapades in Europe asked for any advice or tips I have from my trip, I instantly knew I could recommend the best hostel in London UNTIL I went searching for the details & found out that they are looking for a new location and therefore they’re temporarily closed!! Sad face! Hopefully one day they will reopen and this review won’t be totally wasted. Since my visit to GI I’ve stayed in quite a few other hostels and this one still remains as one of the better hostels.
We stayed in a room with 6 beds (3 bunk beds) each with curtains to add a little privacy. I now realize that having privacy in a hostel room is a huge plus! I can’t recall any other hostel having those.
GI had a full service bar along with a kitchen so you wouldn’t have to go far if you had a craving or wanted to socialize. I think back on it and we didn’t socialize much but this was my first time on vacation outside of America, before this I’d been living in Russia & traveling to the Baltic States with my 7 fellow English teachers. I wish we’d taken more advantage of the opportunity to meet other travelers.
Their bathrooms were also wonderful, not because they were super clean, but they were huge, no line and it was more like a college dorm bathroom of course with separate showers and privacy. But the set up was cool since quite a few I’ve been to there is always a line or it’s really crowded. Plus I think it used to be an old boarding school or something which added to the atmosphere.
Some other advantages were a fitness centre, which is not where you would find me when I am traveling; I prefer to let the city wear me out. They had a game room, how cool is that? Just another way for people to have down time but still be social and make memories. Internet which I always seem to use when I travel, I like to share my life in real time. Free breakfast, traveling is expensive so I like to stay in places that can offer a little more, I don't need a big nice breakfast just enough to keep me going and free breakfast is another way I can save a little money. 24 hour front desk which isn’t a BIG deal, but it comes in handy if you get to your location during early or late hours which seems to happen to me all the time! They also had a great location; I hope that their new location is just as good because it was just a short walk to a tube station.
A large part of why this hostel really stuck with us is because we were planning to spend a few days in Paris and they had luggage storage (and it was secure) as we were walking away from the hostel headed to the Chunnel station to France we realized my travel partner lost his passport. The employees were kind in letting us tear apart our luggage hoping it would be lost within our belongings somewhere but alas it was not. They also helped us figure out what we should do next and gave us the number & directions to the US Embassy. You can read all about that adventure here. I would definitely stay at The Globetrotter Inn again and if they reopen I would definitely check em’ out!
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