HI - Bologna - Due Torri - San Sisto Hostel

first of all -- it's not in Bologna. This is out in the country. People only stay here because they have to. I tried to reserve a bed at the San Sisto (this is the San Sisto 2), which is apparently right next door and a little smaller, but I ended up here. in fact, I'm not really sure where the original San Sisto was, and kind of doubt that it still exists. Anyway, the rooms are huge, with only four beds in each, and they provide lockers and coat racks. No one really seemed friendly. In fact, a lot of people seemed to be really depressed and withdrawn. The bus service is very infrequent -- there is another bus that runs more regularly, but it is a ten- to fifteen-minute walk from the hostel, and hard to find unless you know where you're going (a room mate showed me). There is no food there, and no food nearby. Only a pizza delivery place, and if i remember correctly, a McDonalds if you want to walk for twenty minutes or so. Bologna is a wonderful place. I wish there was a hostel in the city. Until then, you'll have to miss out on the nightlife and stay out here.

This hostel is really hard to find. When I finally go there it was about twelve-ten and they had closed at twelve for the afternoon, so i had to sit outside the front gate in the middle of nowhere until they opened again a few hours later. it was clean and nice inside, but not worth all the effort to get out there.

I stayed in Bologna in March, its a beautiful city! We couldn't find a cheap accommodation in the city center so we stayed at the youth hostel. It's a bit far away, but there is a good bus connection. It's perfect if you want to enjoy the city and have some sleep at night.

Awful. Not a good experience at all. We called from Bologna station and there were two spaces left and they refused to reserve them for us, which was the first annoying thing. Took us about twenty minutes to find the bus stop, twenty minutes waiting for the bus and twenty minutes actually getting there -- it's miles out of town. By that time we were both exhausted and just wanted to lie down. We sat at reception for fifteen minutes before someone bothered to come (even though we had called to say we would be coming). I can only speak for the ladies bathroom, and it was disgusting. That really did it for me, because we had travelled literally halfway across the country that day and what I really needed was a night's sleep and a decent shower -- oh no no no. Water all over the floor, hair all over the shower walls, the basins were clogged with tissue paper for some inexplicable reason and there was no where to hang your towel while you showered. The 11:30 p.m. curfew didn't bother us all that much because we were exhausted that particular night and wanted to go to bed by then, and there was no way we were staying there another night. It was because of this hostel that we didn't stay in Bologna longer, which is a shame because it is worth a longer visit, if you have somewhere half decent to stay in.

Don't bother. This place has a curfew at 11:30 pm which is way too early to enjoy Bologna's excellent nightlife. Better to just stay in Modena (the HI there has no curfew), take the 25 minute train to Bologna, eat drink and be merry, and then hop the train back. Easier than getting all the way out to this hostel, which takes a minimum of 20 minutes and that's if you get the connections timed perfectly. Plus Modena is a very nice town.

Where can we start? This place had a very helpful young lady at reception but other than that its layout had a lot in common with a mental institution! No HI card, you pay extra! 5 km from town, typical HI hostel! Breakfast? One dirty old roll and cold coffee makes for a great start in the morning, maybe they were trying to keep us malnourished to avoid escape! And the number one thing was showering using one hand to wash while the other holds the water flow button down! All in all, a great place to stay — NOT!

We got the 93 bus from the diamond-shaped square after risking our life crossing every road getting there (Italian traffic is totally MAD!). We had rung up in advance from the train station to find that they had space for 1 guy and 1 girl, so we felt a bit pressured to get there as quickly as possible. The bus took a while to get there, and when we got off I felt as if I was on a farm. Since we got in at about 7 p.m., nothing was open. Anyway we got to the hostel, and noticed the backpackers on the opposite side of the road waiting for a bus (not a good sign but we went on). We waited 10 minutes for some staff, as they had conveniently gone out for a snack. Luckily the spaces were still there, the group at the bus stop was obviously too big, phew! We checked in and put our stuff in the rooms. Our room was nice and clean, but the showers could have been cleaner. We went for a walk to find out there was nothing but farms, so we went back slightly p*ssed off. We stayed in the common room all night with a vending machine for food (which would not take 1 euro or 2 euro coins). Thankfully we left the next day. I would not recommend hostelling here, the location is just too ridiculous.

The place is way out of town, but besides that quite ok. The staff are really friendly! There's a supermarket about 1 km from the hostel, where you can get some food.

The staff were so rude and it is so far away from everything. It's a typical HI hostel, so what could you expect?

The most annoying thing about this hostel was that there was no alternative to it! Bologna needs a youth hostel in the middle of town. The location sux.

This hostel is rather inconvenient to get to, and there really is absolutely nothing near it. Even the gas station was closed by 6:30 p.m. So if you stay here bring food with you for dinner or eat early in the town. The bathrooms could be cleaner, but the staff is super friendly and helpful. The grounds are nice, too.

I did not like this hostel at all. It's twenty minutes by bus to get out to it. It's just too far out of town, and there is nothing special about the hostel to make it worth it. Bologna is a good party town, and the 11:30 p.m. curfew just does not work in this respect. Hell, it hardly even works for trying to have a nice meal in the town center and getting back to the hostel in time. Do not stay here on a Saturday night, as the buses back to town on Sunday are almost non-existent. After a 9:30 a.m. kick-out, the next bus wasn't until 11 a.m.-- a lot of wasted time. The bathrooms are scary. I didn't think the place was that busy, so either the bathrooms haven't been cleaned in a week or the few people staying there were absolute pigs. I so did not like this place and am cutting short my stay in Bologna because I've shifted to an expensive hotel in town instead. You need to stay in the center to really enjoy Bologna!

Not bad--it's clean and cheap. It's too far away from the city center, and taking the bus was a pain in the ass.

This hostel was fine. We met a lot of cool travelers and I think that really made the experience for us. The breakfast was as expected; the bread was huge, though. It's far from the city so you have to catch a bus to and from, which is annoying but tolerable. Bologna itself is a cool city. There is a Nutella restaurant on Via Della Indipendenzia (I think) that opens at 3 p.m., and it looked SO good. I wish we had been there when it was open, so if you love nutella, go there! Anyway, the bathrooms were fine, though they could have been cleaner/better. All in all, a decent place. The other hostel here seemed to have a very early curfew, though but it was in a cute building. This place was more like a college dorm.

I find this hostel very nice. I really enjoy its common room area. There was quite a long wait to get a bus from the city centre to the hostel, but I met a lot of other backpackers while waiting for the bus, and we had a great time exchanging tales. The staff may sound quite cold on the phone, but they are quite friendly in person.