Hostel Life

A good hostel is more than just a place to sleep. It's part of the trip experience. A hostel doesn't have to be a hermit's paradise; some offer nice facilities, private bathroom, meals, laundry services and other conveniences. But hostels also offer much more. They offer a fine cross-section of mankind. Traveling by myself, hostel world was my world.

Home Sweet Hostel

These are not the old lonely gentlemen who live in the solitude of their hotel room, eating the stale cooking of the old landlord's wife. People in their twenties and thirties make hostels into their homes, sometimes for years. Some cannot offer the guarantees required for renting an apartment and some just like it. No cleaning to do, varied and international rotating social circles. No bedtime, ever.

Party Hostels

4 a.m. and there are people up surfing the internet. The bar is closed for an hour and the music is turned down. Four well-liquored guys play pool. In an hour or so people will start coming back from the parties. Breakfast will be served two hours later. If it's a more regulated hostel, the rooms would be relatively quiet. In an "Israeli" hostel, music can go on in the rooms until 2 a.m. The first to leave as a result would be the other Israelis.

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Beautiful sceneries and clearness of mind

Don't think smelly cheese and sour faces. The French valley in the Chilean park of Torres del Paine is just beautiful, plain and simple.

A lovely green forest, delicate leaves, a stream, a glacier and a fabulous lake view down under. As a special treat, the French valley is a side track, which means that people can leave their bags at camp and go up the trail, light as feathers.
 
The undersigned feather, however, though moving easily up the mountain, still carried some extra luggage. Moderate incline and beautiful sceneries are among the more effective means for feeding the mind.

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Rain, sun, rain and more rain

Eti and Aviel are now my travel companions. Eti is 25, just about to start her studies, alternative medicine probably. Aviel was recently released from his military service and he has since spent his time as a chef in a Barcelona restaurant. One day, his boss at the restaurant told him: "Look, my sister is going on a trip to South America, why would you not join and keep an eye on her?"

He could not find any reason not to, so by this coincidence he, Eti and I ended up in the same camping site, and through a casual conversation in the hostel's kitchen we became travel companions.

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