Hostels in India were a great place to stay and here is why we enjoyed them.
I am now a big fan of hostels while traveling, especially when you are in a country that is a little difficult. In India we stayed in 5 hostels as we moved around the country. It was extremely helpful being able to ask other travelers about advice for moving into the next area. When we couldn’t purchase our own Railway train tickets the hostel was able to do it for us with no additional fee. If we needed to ask what the approximate rate a Tuk Tuk would cost to get to a location, the hostel staff would give us a number. I am positive this saved us from overpaying many times. Tuk Tuk drivers use an inflated fee for tourist so you must negotiate your price before you get in. If they don’t want to agree to that price, you just ask the next tuk tuk driver. The advice of the hostel helped us negotiate a fair price. The other part of the hostel stay that I really enjoyed was the young energetic atmosphere. I enjoyed hearing the stories of other travelers like the young couple who are roaming the world for 1000 days while they both work remotely on the internet. The story of the girl who had to jump through so many government hoops and finally got her India work visa. Her loud cheering and absolute happiness was fabulous to see. I also get to admire the large number of single travelers that we meet. I never had any idea on how many people travel alone – male and female. Some seem to keep a little to themselves and some seem to pair up with other travelers. I guess I had never thought about the number of people who make these large trips alone. Even though I have the best travel partner in the universe, I feel I would be much more willing to travel alone if I had to. I feel traveling alone is much safer then I have been lead to believe before. Another benefit of staying in a hostel is that they often offer tours or have information on tours or sights to see. Some will even offer ways to save money on seeing some sights. When in Pushkar we went on the most amazing bike ride through the city of Pushkar and its country side. Our local guide took us to some fabulous sights at a very reasonable price. The last big benefit of staying in a hostel is meeting all the staff. We met some of the nicest most helpful people in our India hostels.
So, without further babble, here are the 5 hostels we stayed in while we were in India. The least amount we paid a night was $15 and the most expensive was $24 a night. All the pictures I got off their websites and they look a little nicer than they did in person, however they were not too far off so I feel very comfortable showing them rather than my own. Plus, by the time I took pictures, we had already unpacked and cluttered the place up. Thank you for following along on our adventure. I hope you are planning your next adventure! Beth H.
