Magnum's Backpackers

Pretty awful!
Stayed here as part of a package deal and wasn't impressed! There are not enough reception staff to deal with everybody for a start. Then you have to rent linen which didn't look particularly clean. On getting up to the dorm, there was a nice fat bedbug sitting on the mattress -- nice! So after requesting a change of dorm, new mattress looked a little better although noticed a cockroach scuttle behind another bed -- the wildlife that you don't want to see! Dorms not clean. There is a bathroom attached to the dorms with plentiful hot water which was ok. The bar and restaurant area was good with live music and a nightclub that was good to catch up with your crew after a Whitsundays trip. However, if you want to store your luggage at Magnums before going on your Whitsundays trip, it will cost you $5 for the privilege and they only open the luggage store at certain times which is very restrictive and annoying. Didn't test the kitchen -- the dorms put me off so much I wasn't even going to risk it! When you check out, they don't want your bottom sheet which is really dodgy -- how often do they get washed?

Poor
Don't stay here unless you like rude staff and dingy dorms. There is a Breakfast room, not a kitchen, and they close the kitchen at 9 a.m. in the morning for cleaning. the staff are always too busy checking in new people and selling tours to bother about anyone who's already staying. Beware, they will only get your bags from storage when they want to, it's meant to be every hour but they never stick to it I wasted a lot of time waiting around! The best thing about the hostel is the gardens it's set in, very lush full of ponds and tropical plants.

Don't go!
Staff really rude, and worse, this hostel is full of bedbugs. they ate me!

The staff at this hostel are so rude! They're too busy to pay any attention to you at reception or help anybody out and they are always late opening luggage room. Rooms may be cheap but there are lots of extras to pay for, linen, crockery, luggage storage. I wouldn't recommend staying here, there are other hostels practically next door which are better.

We stayed here for one night in December 2004 and all was fine. The two of us shared a tiny room with a bunk bed, but it was clean and we had some amenities to use (kettle, sink). Washroom and toilet facilities were shared with the whole block but that didn't prove to be a problem. The place has a nice, tropical feel to it and had a decent atmosphere thanks to the design of the village complex, open bar, and adjoining nightclub. Location slap bang in the middle of Airlie Beach was also a bonus, but the town is so small that it's practically impossible not to have a good setting. Sailing out to the Whitsunday Islands and visiting Whitehaven Beach are the obvious attractions, as is the manmade lagoon where it is safe to swim away from the jellyfish. Staff could have been friendlier and trying to charge us for showers once we had returned from the islands was Scrooge-like to say the least (we had already checked out but our bags were still in storage). Apart from that, all was fine but I can see why it is not to everyone's taste.

Looks ok on the outside but rodent droppings on supposedly clean sheets not fun -- avoid!

If you want to know what hell looks like then spend a night in this cesspool of filthy surroundings and filthy people. I'm serious, it's that bad. I can't believe that people would stay at this place for any longer than one minute, the fact that people do amazes me even more but I guess it's true that there's a stupid trashbag born every minute and they all stay at Magnums! Gross, disinfect yourself if you pass within a five-kilometre radius of this swamp.

Not as bad as others have made out, but certainly nothing special. Everything comes as an extra (baggage storage) while you are on the cruise. The name says it all, its a huge place packed full of people and not very friendly. Great location though!

I stayed for one night and i was not overly impressed. The hostel is basically spread out over a wide area sort of like a holiday village. sadly the class of people it attracted did not impress me either. Large groups of scummy British backpackers who just wanna get laid and pissed every night. i had some toiletries stolen whilst i was there. If you are a quiet single traveller this is not the place for you. However if you are in a large group and want to party, it is quite well priced.

I stayed there for two nights in December 2005 and at first it reminded me as a sort of holiday club. It's very big and very busy. Our room was a quiet one, the toilets and bathrooms were clean. BUT: In our room was a very strange smell and we tried to get some fresh air in (didn't work very well). Afterwards I knew, what I have smelled: Bedbugs! Our bed was a bedbugcastle and they ate me for dinner. I had itches for one and a half week and it was absolutely terrible. I couldn't sleep, because I was itching all the time. I never experienced bedbugs before and so it took a while to recognize what tortured me. A few days later we stayed in another hostel and the guests there told me they also stayed at "Magnums" and they and most of the other people they know who stayed there were bitten. The surroundings there are nice, especially after very quiet days in Westaustralia, but it's not worth it. I definitely cannot recommend this hostel.

Would you like to arrive in Airlie beach after a long trip to stay in a room that smells like cum? Has dirty sheets on the bed? Dirty dishes piled on the counter? Insect infestations? Dead bugs in the bathroom sinks? Drunk people screaming outside your door all night long? Paper thin walls so that you can hear EVERYTHING going on next door? Trash all over teh floor? If so this is the place for you. I would not stay here again if THEY paid ME.

I stayed here in February 2005 and thought it was just AWFUL!!!!! I hadn't checked this place out beforehand as the night's accommodation was bundled in with my Whitsundays trip. I arrived, tired, at 9pm after a very long bus journey from Cairns and checked in. The girl who was on reception was extremely rude and clearly last in the queue when social skills were handed out. I was allocated a bed in an 8 bed dorm (a girl in Cairns had pre-warned me not to take a 10 bed dorm!!!)- it was DISGUSTING. I know that you can't choose your roommates when backpacking but even so, I don't think the dorm had been cleaned for weeks. A pair of skidmarked underpants rested on "my" bed - the whole dorm reeked of vomit, the bathroom was absolutely filthy - I didn't even want to put my backpack down on the floor, let alone SLEEP in that place. I've stayed in hostels worldwide and am happy to rough it but this was just too much. For the first and only time in a year of backpacking I refused to stay in a dorm. This was THE worst dorm I encountered - Cambodia and Laos offered better than this. On a more positive note, a different girl was working the desk when I returned to reception. She was very apologetic and fortunately for me she managed to put me in a double room for no extra charge - however this was only because they had received a last minute cancellation. She was helpful and clearly doing her best in a place where nobody else gave a monkeys. The double room I had was fine but I really would reiterate: avoid the dorms like the plague. Even if, like me, you were in Airlie Beach just for a night before the Whitsundays I would still recommend staying elsewhere. The boats leave early and to be honest you need to get a good sleep the night before if you can. If, on the other hand, you are simply gagging to drink yourself senseless, prance around in a wet T-shirt, swallow some spunky foam, throw up all over your dorm, get laid, and get savaged by bedbugs then you're probably in the right place.

Life is short, party hard!!! That's their motto and they live by it! Everyone is so friendly and the atmosphere is great. The rooms are pretty clean and they are set in a tropical landscape. Make sure you go to the nightclub, there's a foam pit on Monday night. Other nights have bull-riding competitions, wet T-shirt competitions, jelly wrestling, and much more!

Magnums was a great place to stay if you want to party. It is THE place to be in Airlie. It's also really great for booking Whitsunday sailing trips...not only did we get a good price for our trip, but they gave us two free nights accommodation and free Internet. The rooms were nice enough as well. But don't stay here unless you want to party.

There were rats everywhere....but then you get that in those kinds of places. Once I got over that it was a cool place to stay, the cheapest you will find. Don't use Internet there, it's overpriced.