MC Hostel, Brezice > Reviews (1)

While all my Slovenian friends are internet-savvy and are contactable by email, trying to conduct business online in Slovenia, particularly in the tourism sector, can be highly frustrating. Emails get bounced back, websites appear no longer available. When hotels do have websites you can only make enquiries, you can’t book directly online, and these automated enquiries seldom result in a response.

I had picked up a ‘Posavje in Your Pocket’ guide a short while back and was tempted by the prospect of a visit to one of the towns in that region of the country. We were planning to fly into Zagreb and cross into Slovenia stopping somewhere on the way to Maribor and several of the towns mentioned in the guide are on the mainline between Zagreb and Ljubljana providing an easy way for us to access the region. Under each town there were several accommodation options listed, among them apartments at thermal spas, town centre hotels, hostels, tourist farms and ‘gostisces’ (roughly translated as a traditional restaurant with some accommodation attached).

The process of investigating costs and availability was a long and drawn out one; after a couple of hours I could hardly focus on the screen. I emailed a couple of places directly and none of them replied. I risked one automatic enquiry form on a hotel website and one on the ‘I Feel Slovenia’ website, the official portal of the country’s tourist board, neither of which garnered a response (and several weeks later still have had no response). I tried Hostelbookers.com but the youth hostel in Brezice appeared to be more expensive than some of the hotels and, utterly frustrated with the hostel’s lack of response to a direct email, I reluctantly contacted them by telephone and reserved a room. No card details were required, a name was sufficient to seal the reservation.

The hostel is known as MC-Brezice, the initials standing for ‘mladinski center’, which translates as ‘youth centre’. Most Slovenian towns of any reasonable size have a ‘mladinski center’ and facilities vary. Brezice’s is brand new and comprises a hostel with dorms and private rooms (some but not all en suite), a concert/film venue and a large café-bar with terrace. The whole complex stands just inside the entrance of the town park, opposite Brezice’s splendid castle. In spite of being a very picturesque town that should attract tourists, the tourist information centre on the main street closed down and visitors are now directed to the one at Catez (a nearby village which has outgrown its boundaries with the continuing development of Terme Catez, a large spa complex), or to the mini TIC in the foyer of the MC-Brezice hostel. Guests at the hostel therefore have at hand an excellent selection of maps and brochures relating to the local area, and to up to date information for local buses and trains.

The hostel has its own reception but we had followed the directions of a local resident and cut through the park, arriving at the café first rather than the hostel.

If you are driving you do need to come the ‘proper way’ as that is where the car-parking is and there is only one access road. The reception is open for a couple of hours in the morning and again later in the afternoon. When it is not open, you can check in at the café. This hostel does not have a curfew and I get the impression that when there are gigs on in the main building, some young people stay here because they don’t have transport home after the show.

Both of the staff members we encountered spoke excellent English and were really friendly and happy to help. This hostel has a laid back friendly feel but there were very few guests when we were there, no doubt due to the fact that it was term time. Perhaps for the ease of the cleaner, or perhaps because of the layout of the hostel, the room next to ours was also in use and we could hear the three guests in there through the wall. This was a bit irritating as you’d think with the place so empty, that it would be fairly quiet.

Each room is themed with a different animal, bird or insect and an outline image and the Slovenian name not only on the wall outside each door, but also on the wall in the room. We stayed in 'Storkija' (the stork). I thought this was a lovely simple way to add something different to each room because they are really quite clinical in appearance. Art work by local young people of different ages was displayed on the walls in the corridors.

Our room comprised two single beds (each one had an additional bed that could be pulled out like a drawer from under the mattress though only one could have been used due to the size of the room), two simple desks and two chairs to sit at the desks. There was a clothes hanging area just inside the door to the room and space to stash rucksacks. Some shelving on the wall provided a little extra storage space for books and personal items. The en suite bathroom had a shower, toilet and washbasin while it wasn’t a large bathroom good use had been made of the space and someone had considered useful things such as pegs and shelves.

The accommodation was rather over-endowed with bins. There was one in the sleeping area and one pedal bin the in bathroom as well as a recycling bin with three labelled slots this would have been great had there been three separate compartments for the litter but whichever slot you posted your litter into, it was only going to fall into one big bin.

Bedding was provided but we had to make the beds up ourselves; that’s OK, we’re used to that in hostels. We weren’t specifically asked to strip the beds on leaving but we did anyway in case we had over-looked a request so to do. Towels were not provided, not had we brought them (in spite of knowing we’d be staying in a hostel) with us, hoping to be able to hire them (and willing to buy one if necessary because we could always just use it at the flat when we got there). The receptionist went to get towels and when I asked the cost she told me that there is usually a cost of €0.

50 a day for towel hire but she would not charge us; while this was very kind and much appreciated, I don’t suppose they would do this when the hostel is busy.

There was a kitchen and dining room on the ground floor. While there was lots of seating and tables, the cooking area seemed small; it was, however, well-equipped and immaculately clean. Just along the corridor there was a laundry room with large coin operated machines and driers. There are single sex toilets and shower rooms on each accommodation floor and, when I sneaked a quick look, I could see that they too were sparkling and well maintained.

A door at the end of the corridor on the second floor led out onto a roof terrace with chairs and tables. This area, and the grounds in general, were tidy and well looked after. Overall this is a smart and modern hostel which makes many British hostels look dowdy and boring. Only in so much as the rather uncomfortable mattresses (which both of us found too hard) did the standard of this hostel coincide with, say, a YHA hostel in the UK.

Free wi-fi is available throughout the premises and it worked without a hitch. Speed was good and connection was easy.

Breakfast can be arranged for a small fee but we had a train to catch and grabbed a coffee and a pastry on our way to the station. For groups they’ll lay on the breakfast in the kitchen, for individuals and smaller parties you go to the bar. With advance notice you can also have the staff make you up a packed lunch for a small charge.

We paid approximately €44 for a twin room with private bathroom; this includes the tourist tax which is currently €1.01 (weird, I know) per person per night. One to two years ago this would have got you a nice room in a pension with breakfast but today you’d pay between €50-60 for that type of accommodation. Opting for a room without a bathroom would have reduced the cost by about €4.