Cambie Hostel – Seymour

Perfect for backpackers. Nice bar downstairs, simple but comfy rooms, charming staff and nice muffins in the morning. I liked it :)

Never before have I left a review on Unilocal,but this time I feel like I have to. I moved to Vancouver from a place far away and didn’t have a place to stay before I found an apartment, hence decided to stay at this location. It is cheap, but this is the only advantage of this place. The disadvantages? 1. The smell, rooms smell funny and moldy; 2. Windows are so old that they break when you want to open them (or close); 3. The staff doesn’t clean the trash bins in the room regularly, seems they only do it when a new person checks in, or not even…; 4. Not sure they even change be bed linen to be honest, one of my roommates was very neat, so when she left, she made the bed, and then linens were not changed; 5. The bathroom, always dirty, also one toilet is in front of the window (great privacy) and the second one has leaky pipes on top of it, so you get some cold drops on your head while doing your business. Additionally, toilet doors are short and have inch wide holes– again, great privacy; 6. The noise– add up construction work, street noise and loud music from the bar downstairs…; 7. I would not have written this review if not for that– I am fairly certain that they have bed bugs. Every morning I woke up with a new itchy bite. What a pleasure. Never staying there again! Worst hostel I have ever been to.

Alright, let’s get the good stuff out of the way first: no bedbugs. No rats. Nothing was stolen from me even without lockers in the room. Staff was honestly SO kind, always willing to give suggestions on places to see, and tried to fix what was wrong if it was within their powers. Cleaning staff was always happy to help out with any requests as well. Breakfast muffins were pretty large, satisfying to a morning-​food-​hating European anyway. Location’s pretty decent, would probably get ⁸⁄₁₀.
Now, the bad stuff. Bunk beds on second floor with half-​arsed window that doesn’t open well, and. No. Fans. Honestly, I woke up in the middle of the night for five nights in a row nearly hallucinating cause my body was overheating. Wish I was kidding. Okay, just go for a refreshing shower last thing at night and first thing in the morning then. Ha! Sure. If you can find a washroom that’s safe to enter. The ladies washrooms were always either clogged, refusing to flush, or had water from the washroom above waterfalling into the toilets and showers. Note there only are two women’s showers and two toilets to each floor. The hostel wasn’t even fully occupied, so I can only speculate how bad it might get when fully booked. Spent a lot of time awkwardly walking in on half naked men in the men’s washrooms. Yeah. Uh… Hi. Doesn’t help that the showers are matte glass showing everything behind it, no closed off changing areas, and gaps in the toilet stalls you could pass a book through.
If you need a roof over your head for a low price to see the city, and occasionally want to use a washroom (though not on your own time, but whenever one is temporarily in use), AND aren’t afraid of possibly being seen naked by really just about anybody staying in the same hostel, stay here. Would not recommend staying for more than 2 nights.

This hostel is really nice and very well-​located in walkable Vancouver. The rooms are clean and comfy, and the bathrooms are fairly well-​maintained. The front desk staff is very nice and helpful. There are two bars that share a building with the hostel that we really enjoyed.
My one complaint is the lack of parking. There are a few public lots nearby, but they are expensive and poorly-​secured. I’d definitely come stay here again, but I’d research my parking options more thoroughly first next time.
Overall, the Cambie is a solid option.

I like how this place is max 4 people to the room but pay the small difference and get the 2 person to a room.
My room was basically Freezing cold so most of the time I was awake and in my room I would prop my door open to let the hallway heat come in.
Shared hallway bathroom was clean
You can hear the music from down stairs bumping pretty loud but I didn’t mind this since I went to bed after the music stopped.
My room also kind of smelled a little funky/​raunchy
Location is pretty good since its right between gastown and downtown
2.5 *‘s

Not bad. Some of the guests at this hostel seem a little strange. It’s like the students at the University of BC are living here on the cheap. It’s got a bar below it, so it’s a little noisy until around 1AM… but then it kind of mellows out, which is nice. The room is tiny, but clean. It’s good for a couple travellers who want a decent place to sleep and a safe place to put their bags, but don’t need much else. Shower and bathroom facilities are pretty old and a little run down, but work well enough. The hostel includes free breakfast and WiFi – definite bonuses.

Are you looking for a tiny room to crash in after a night of partying in Vancouver? Don’t mind that the bathrooms/​showers are down the hall and shared?
$ 30 per person (for a 2-​bunk-​bed room) or $ 35 (for a full size bed room) a good price for you?
Then this might be just the spot to PFO (aka: crash) at!
The young woman at the front desk was friendly and said she has stayed at the hostel before. She also said that staying there also meant we could get on the list for the show happening at the pub downstairs. (Probably a nice bonus for many!)
Is this good for some people? Definitely!
Good for us? Not so much.
Why? Our standards are apparently higher than what this place provides, we were willing and able to spend more than $ 70 on a room, we weren’t looking to get wasted, and we had a car that we could either sleep in for free or use to find cheaper lodging outside of downtown Vancouver.

We moved to Vancouver without an apartment to live in, so we booked a room at this hostel. What a hole. The room was so small we couldn’t even fit our suitcases in it. We had to leave half of our stuff in the basement. (And we didn’t bring that much. We lugged it all from the airport ourselves.) Not to mention it’s right above a bar so it’s impossible to sleep until some ungodly hour of the morning. (Not night, morning.)
The bathroom was disgusting. I’m pretty sure this place doesn’t own a mop, and the paper towel dispenser ran out of paper towels the night we got there and wasn’t refilled by the time we checked out.
We were told that if we wanted to check out early, we should give a day’s notice since we prepaid for a couple of weeks. Well, we did give them notice. Three days notice. (We found another place to stay that was cheaper and it couldn’t possibly be any worse than this place.) We ended up having to check back at the desk every few hours to get our money in bits and pieces. They were incredibly rude.
The best part was when we were ten minutes late checking out because the person at the desk when we left for breakfast told us the wrong time. The guy who had replaced her when we came back said «Uh, are you guys checking out? ‘Cause checkout was ten minutes ago.»
That’s when I yelled «After the crap from you we’ve had to deal with all weekend, you’re going to give us lip for your own staff’s uselessness and vaguely defined rules and policies that you never follow anyway?!» and jumped over the desk and choked him to death. Ok, fine, not really, but I totally should have. I probably could have gotten away with it.
Anyway, never, ever, ever, ever stay here. Never. It has absolutely no redeeming features and the staff is completely useless.