H.I. Portland - Hawthorne (Portland)

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This hostel is hippy in appearance but corporate in attitude. Like the only other HI hostel in town it is more concerned with credit card holders than travellers (but unlike the HI Portland - Northwest the Portland - Hawthorne does not completely discriminate against cash).


I don't use plastic and it was an hour before I could reserve a bed. I literally had to be thirty minutes away before the bastards would "probably" hold a bed for me. Great backpacker spirit! Just be sure to be in the rucksack with MasterCard and Visa! Once there I was explained a small litany of rules to stay by. My stay was all right and the hostel is clean and eclectic and the beds do include blankets and linens but I could not shake off the corporate-ness of the place. Didn't find it all that welcoming. This is not to imply the staff looked at me cross or were in any way racist or rude. But they are all about "policy".

Minutes after I'd signed in one poor guy with a broken arm was sent back out into the rain because he shared, just as he signed the guest register, that he'd been off and on in Oregon since December looking for steady work. Whoops, too much information! The hostel's policy expressly prohibits "residents" from receiving lodgings. Didn't matter he paid with a credit card either. Broken arm homeboy was sent on his way. I was laughing my ass off (on the inside). Here he is trying to be all familiar and chatted himself right out of a bed...and, man, was he pissed!!

I could not shake off the corporate-ness of the place

I passed through Portland two weeks later but didn't even entertain the thought of staying here again. It's located in Portland's Bohemian District but outside of the eccentric appearances of the furnishings and staff there ain't nothing Bohemian about this hostel.



3031 SE Hawthorne Blvd
503.236.3380
www.portlandhostel.org