Set in a fantastic location, just a few blocks from the shopping Mecca that is Market Street, the San Francisco International Hostel makes a perfectly pleasant stay in one of my favourite cities. Known as the biggest and best party hostel in San Fran, this place is always buzzing with activity and fun…they even offer free beer every night in the bar/club downstairs in the basement. Yes, you read that right. FREE beer!
Aside from the party atmosphere, the hostel has plenty of other things to offer. There is free wifi throughout the entire building, and a free breakfast of pancakes, which you can actually make all day everyday. The kitchen is large and quite modern, with plenty of space and plenty of fridges. The adjoining dining/lounge area is absolutely huge and provides a nice place to eat or just hang out and watch tv on the widescreen.
There are 5 floors of dorms and private rooms, with a lounge area and laundry room on the first floor. Each floor has two toilets and at least one shower, and on the 1st & 3rd floors there are ladies shower rooms, with four showers in each and space to put your clothes and do your makeup. All the rooms also have a sink in, meaning you can brush your teeth without ever having to leave your room…oh it’s the little things!
The rooms themselves are slightly in the small side, but are perfectly adequate. We stayed in two different 4-bed female dorms, the second being a much better size, but it was right next to the bathroom, so it was quite noisy at times. For these rooms we paid about $20 per night, which I would say is a pretty good deal. One thing about the rooms though is that there aren’t any lockers…only teeny tiny ones in a room on the first floor, so I usually took my valuables with me.
So overall a very good hostel, and one I would definitely recommend if you’re ever in San Francisco. The only real issues were that firstly, there were three of us, and when we checked in they wouldn’t let us pay separately as they said they could only do one transaction per booking…pretty ridiculous if you ask me! And secondly, when we went away to visit a friend, we weren’t allowed to leave our big bags at the hostel overnight, even though we had a booking to come back the next night! Weird.
Dates stayed: 10 – 13 May & 14 – 16 May 2012
My Rating
Overall: 81%
Atmosphere: 85%
Cleanliness: 85%
Location: 88%
Staff: 80%
Safety: 70%
Value for Money: 80%
Roo Around The World 
I stayed here in August! My first stop on my RTW 🙂 Wasn’t a massive fan – my bedding clearly hadn’t been changed since the last guest left and when I complained, they did nothing. Thank God I had my sleeping bag! A good social hostel though. How awesome is San Fran!?
Loved San Fran. But yeah it wasn’t the cleanest, just a good atmosphere really, which always pulls a place up in my books!