Zippy Koala Backpackers

I stayed at Zippy Koala (affiliated with Riverboat Bungalow) back in March 2005 and the owner's name wasn't Peter back then. This was a great hostel (with a free swimming pool and table tennis) and was cleaned daily by a professional cleaner. The management were really friendly and found me a great hourly rate job $13/hour. The hostel owners do not employ the backpackers — they connect them with other people needing workers. The work was great and the accommodation great value for money. They charged $132 per week but offered some discounts if you were prepared to do some odd jobs around the hostel.

I thought the management was great!! I stayed there in August 2005 (I think they had recently taken over management) and they went out of their way to find me a great hourly rate job in a packing shed. The hostel was very clean and the facilities were great. They even put on free beer and barbecues every four weeks or so — what more could you want!!. A very friendly and fun place to be. Highly recommend.

Under new management, this hostel is now half its original size, lacking in good hourly paid jobs and run by unenthusiastic, vindictive and dishonest owners. Voice a complaint and it will be held against you, ask for a better job (e.g. better than $200 a week in my case) and you will be chided like an ungrateful child. It may improve when the owners have a few years tucked under their belt, but I would currently suggest approaching with caution.

Oh my, I just do NOT know what to say about this place. I would review it, but I think the pictures I took would scare some people. In one word: NO. Don't go there. Don't even think about it. Peter, the guy who owns it, is a firm believer of slavery. He won't let you stay unless you work for him picking grapes. You'll make about 2$ an hour doing hard labor and the place costs 15$ a night. It's not even worth 2$! The place is SO gross, dorms with holes in the walls, saggy beds, bugs in the bathrooms and the kitchen and couches with stuffing coming out. Thankfully, I was saved from insanity (I hope) by the workers I stayed with. We all got together and formed a mutiny, escaping Zippy's one morning and vowing to never return. And NO I am NOT being too dramatic! Just ask anyone who has been there...if they haven't erased it from their memory. On a lighter note, Mildura is a cool town and the river is a good place to cool off.

I stayed at this hostel and it is a complete nightmare, especially when you are there during harvest time. I have been around here some time so I know what I'm talking about. The owner knows very well everything is booked out and good jobs are rare during harvest time, so she will treat you like a slave! It can even happen that you'll get kicked out of the hostel and your job for nothing. And then you're stuck there in a town where every single bed is booked out! And then she spreads lies so you could even think it was your fault! But it is all about the money! When the waiting lists are long, you are worth NOTHING to her! She tries to cheat you with the rent, so take good care of your receipts if you are dumb or choice-less enough to stay there. The owner enjoys doing stuff like this. So much for the owner; now to the hostel. If you enjoy being bitten by bedbugs over and over, you will love this hostel! Everything is well prepared for bedbugs: the wooden interior isn't painted, the mattresses are ripped open, etc. Even repeated and massive chemical treatment couldn't get the bugs out of the rooms. The overall impression I got from this hostel is that it's dirty and uncomfortable. Because there are no lockers, several valuable things were stolen during the short time I stayed there. The kitchen is always a mess and there are just a few proper pots, and most of them are broken. The bathrooms are way too small for so many people and are very dirty most of the time. The hostel is a good walk away from an Internet cafe. Forget about the Internet in the hostel! It's slow and totally worthless! Hell, STAY AWAY from this place! Most of the jobs are crap anyway. (I got to know several people who were only earning 10-50 Australian dollars a day!) And to get the good jobs, you have to be very lucky! Oh, and did I mention it is the most expensive hostel in the place?