By: Blonde Two
I felt very pleased with myself when I booked my London accommodation, smug even. A central location, a restaurant, a self catering kitchen and all for £26. You guessed it, thanks to the YHA and their DofE discounts, I had a night in the town for a quarter of the price of the other accommodation that I looked at.
I have to say that YHA London Central was a sight for sore Blonde eyes when I had finished getting lost on Thursday evening. At last a place that I understood, friendly staff (very friendly), friendly fellow guests (mostly friendly) and a friendly microwave in which to heat up my dinner.
My bed was comfy and I had a little private bathroom just off the bedroom. At least, it would have been private if it hadn’t been for the fact that I had elected to stay in a shared room and that the shared room was fully occupied with four ladies.
I liked Lady-One immediately because when I arrived, she was sitting up in her top bunk ‘stuffing her face’ (her words not mine). True her umbrella did keep falling of the wardrobe and I (being a generous Blonde) did have to keep putting it back up again; and she did insist on shuffling around on newspaper instead of walking across the floor in her bare feet but on the whole, she seemed fairly normal.
Lady-Two was less appealing, not because she was extraordinarily tall, but because she didn’t appear to be able to speak when greeted. She clearly wasn’t pleased at finding Lady-One and Blonde-Two in her room and didn’t stay very long.
I went to bed at about ten thirty. Early I know for London but I was exhausted and needed to catch a train the next morning. I didn’t expect an uninterrupted night’s sleep and I was right. I didn’t hear Lady-Two come to bed.
Lady-Three arrived aptly at three in the morning. I kept my eyes closed (a lesson I have learnt from jet lag) but I believe that she brought with her forty of the world’s loudest plastic bags. Not only that, she obviously had an urgent need to shuffle through every single one of them. It was dark by then, so in order to complete this impressive (I was not impressed) feat of shuffling, she propped the bathroom door open so that the light shone into the bedroom (the noise of the fan was less than soothing!)
Lady-Two then found her voice (a relief I am sure) and told Lady-Three in no uncertain terms what she thought of bag shuffling and bathroom dooring. There then ensued an argument that I didn’t really understand about radiators and windows, more shuffling, more light turning on, a bed creaking above me and then silence (or as much silence as there ever is in London – where do people drive to at that time of day?)
I dozed off again but not for long because Lady-One arrived back (no doubt from more excessive dining) and did a bit of shuffling of her own before climbing into her bunk.
We then slept – or at least I did. Lady-Two lost her voice again that morning and disappeared fairly early. I got up next and avoided the temptation of extreme noisiness (it was so tempting) because Ladies One and Three were still abed.
I haven’t tried sharing a bunk room with strangers since I was a lass in New Zealand. I am not sure that I am going to do so again. That said, the bunk was comfy, the room very clean and the price was definitely right.
I am sure JK Rowling didn’t ever have to go through a night like that! Roll on famous authorhood and 5 star hotels!
I bet they weren’t blondes.
From my trip last summer – Swanage YHA:
“Last night I went to bed in the YHA dorm before the other two occupants, so didn’t meet them till this morning. I noticed one guy was reading Money Weekly – what can there be to write about every week on that subject? I am pretty good at getting people going conversation-wise but reckoned I might be out of my depth here. Anyway he was nerdish and uncommunicative as may have been predicted.
The other guy turned out to be one of those typical Jeremiahs one often meets. When he heard I was planning to stay at Lulworth Cove YHA the night after next he was in his element, “Oh! It’s had to close down for the moment, don’t think you’ll be able to stay there, there’s been a Nova outbreak”.
I wonder if guys are better at sharing a room than girls. You are right of course, none of them were Blondes. I have shared YHA rooms, bunkhouse rooms, hotel rooms and tents with B1 and there was no rustling or shuffling whatsoever! Definitely not Blondes!
I used to travel with several sarongs and as long as you have a bottom bunk these can be tied to create a curtain right round your bunk, combined this with a good set of ear plugs or good music on comfy head phones and sleeping is easy!
Sarongs are an excellent idea – will take some next time (next time!?!?) Bad timing on my part with the earplugs – I had just given them to Mr B2 to use on one of his bike packing adventures.
London hostels always seem to be a bit like that (although I usually stay at St Paul’s) – and they never seem to have up the ‘please be quiet after 11pm’ signs that the lakes ones do. I suppose the people staying there aren’t as tired, either!
Earplugs are definitely the way to go.
Maybe I should have got out of bed and made my own ‘be quiet’ sign. At three in the morning though, it might have risked including some choice rude words.
Hee – my last hostel night – some years ago – was at Stratford-on-Avon, another big, busy hostel but with lovely grounds. In the morning (I sleep like a log) the lady in the bottom bunk thanked me profusely for NOT having rolled around all night. I’ve been wondering ever since whether it was her way of gently telling me that I had, or whether I genuinely didn’t roll about – but how can one tell, or even do anything about it, when one is asleep? I’m always afraid I might say something dreadful in my sleep – – – –
I hostel rarely – they don’t take dogs.