Solna Vandrarhem Hotel & Hostel

Solna Vandrarhem Hostel is located on the grounds of an ecopark off a street called Enköpingsvägen. The hostel is up a short private road from the Vandrarhem Hotel.

There’s plenty of free parking if you’re driving. If not, there are buses and trains. It is fifteen minutes from Central Station on the regional Marsta train, which runs every fifteen minutes during peak hours. It’s a good twelve minutes walk from the Ulrikesdal station (where you get off) to the hostel, but it is signed. Or you can catch a bus from Ulrikesdal station -- a number 505 (towards Solna C) or 540 (towards Tensta C), get off at Råstahem, follow the signs (four minutes). The nearest shop is a useful mini-mart shop over the road from the Ulrikesdal station in a little pedestrian shopping center.

The hostel accommodation is quite jolly-looking -- wooden, prefabricated cabins with big yellow suns carrying the cabin numbers. They offer four-bed bunk dorms, which are quite spacious in hostel terms. You can pay a bit more to occupy a room with just two of you, but the prices are very reasonable. The hostel also has more expensive hotel rooms, some with en-suite facilities. The rooms have good heavy locks and although the same key also unlocks the front door, it doesn’t open the other rooms in the cabin (we tested this on an empty room).

Each cabin has ten such four-bed rooms (two bunks). There are separate ladies and gents toilets, each with two washbasins and two showers with excellent water pressure. There seems to be plenty of hot water, but our cabin wasn’t full when we were there. A nice touch is the paper towels that are provided in both the toilets and the kitchen.

The rooms are plainly decorated and have two desks and chairs, two good sized hanging wardrobes and cupboards, plus several electrical sockets (two-pin). The bunks are substantial and reasonably comfortable. A reading light and a little shelf for each bed on which to put earplugs/specs would have been useful. Take a headtorch if you get up at night or like to read in bed.

The hostel enforces a very strict no-smoking rule inside the cabins and will fine you for the additional cleaning, evict you, and ban you from returning. Consequently, the rooms smell nice and fresh and each has its own window, which can be opened.

The kitchen and eating area is quite small but it does have a freezer and a double communal fridge, plus microwave and four-ring electric cooker. There is a filter coffee machine but we couldn’t make the one in our cabin work properly. They supply basic kitchen utensils (but the tin opener was broken), cutlery, plates, mugs, glasses, and bowls, but not nearly enough for everyone who could be staying there.

There are bar stools and quite cool bar tables to seat ten to twelve people eating, plus an open plan TV lounge area with soft seating for another six or so. But the cabin does sleep up to forty. Plus there’s a BBQ area by the car park you can use. If you don’t want to cook, the main reception area has a restaurant and bar where you can buy breakfast and dinner. The same reception building has internet access points and a pool table. You can apparently also book the sauna at reception. All the communal areas are well cleaned every day and the design of the place is pretty functional so it’s easy to keep clean.

The hostel reception staff is really helpful when asked for anything directly, and, like most Swedes, speak good English. You can get useful maps of the local area from reception.

-- Exclusive Hostelz.com Review