Turtle Hostel

Turtle Hostel brought back memories of backpacking through Europe! There’s a very European-​hostel vibe here. It’s a cheap stay with moderate cleanliness, as long as you don’t use the showers immediately after the hairy québécois patrons. Sue was very sweet. The back deck is a quaint little hangout I wish I could have taken advantage of more, but we only stayed for one night. I’d definitely be back.
Also looks like there have been renos on the heritage home, so it’s likely to improve even more.

This is listed as a backpacker’s hostel, but it’s more of a cheap stay than anything else. It’s clean enough (for a person of low expectations), I’m just mostly disappointed in the other people staying here. I came, in part, for backpacker culture — and there is NONE! Most people staying here are actually living here… Lame. It’s not super near anything, and the entire building (a large house) is of very cheap quality and not impressive. I will not stay here again, and I would recommend against staying here to anyone else.

A friend and I stayed here for three days on a trip to Victoria. The office was only open certain hours so we actually had to park down the street and keep ourselves entertained for a few hours before checking in. Also, there is very limited parking in an alleyway, and if you park on the street, you’ll have to move your car early in the morning when the parking lane becomes a driving lane.
We reserved a private room, but they didn’t actually have a private room with only 2 beds in it (we would have had to share a bed), so she booked us in a dorm room with five beds. When we got there, she tried to talk us into sharing our room with other people, even though we had specifically requested a private room.
There was a locker in the room that could not be locked even if you had a padlock. There was a very questionable lock on the door (the kind you could open with a credit card) and no deadbolt. The window was reachable from the alleyway outside and there was no way to lock the window. Because of the icky smell in the hostel, we had to keep the window open all night anyway, so we had to rig up our own little «alarm system» in case anyone tried to come in through the window.
There are some «guests» of questionable trustworthiness who appear to be permanent residents (if you do chores, apparently you can stay for free… FOREVER). The bathrooms are ATROCIOUS… do NOT attempt to use the bathrooms without at least a sturdy pair of flip flops.
If at all possible, try staying at Ocean Island, which is just a couple blocks away, much safer, much cleaner, and only 2 or 3 bucks more a night.