YHAgroup.org.uk

Last month I reported that the old Accommodation Guide will not be replaced this year. Now there’s been a post on the YHA forum giving (briefly) the latest state of play:

An update to the last issue of the Guide will be mailed in early March. Meanwhile, [the YHA] website is the best way of getting up to date information about Youth Hostels, and YHA more generally.

It’s not clear, but I assume that “an update to the last issue of the guide” will be a slim supplement to that document listing hostels which have closed and detailing ones that have opened since 2007.

This is better than nothing, but a long way short of ideal. We need a new handbook!

However, if we have to wait for one, let’s put the hiatus to good use and give YHA a steer as to what should go into it when (or if) it comes out. Let’s hear your thoughts, either on the YHA forum or in the comments here.

YHA have announced two more years of its Doing It 4 Real summer camp scheme, which offer children access to a range of (mostly) outdoor activities, with big subsidies for those from less well off backgrounds.

I don’t know what it’s doing 4… sorry, for their literacy, but this has to be a good thing both for the kids and for the YHA attracting a new generation of hostellers. Who knows, they might end up joining your group one day!

It’s been reported on the BBC and in the South Wales Evening Post that a new hostel will shortly be opening in the Afan Valley near Neath Port Talbot.

Bryn Bettws Lodge is a centre catering principally for mountain bikers seeking to take advantage of the Afan Forest Park’s world-class trails. Of course you don’t have to cycle – there’s walking, climbing, watersports and various other pursuits available in the area.

The former Pelenna mountain centre will be developed into a 40-bed hostel, operating under the enterprise scheme. It should open just after Easter.

On the YHA forum yesterday, the following announcement was made of an important development for those with an interest in the history of the Association:

The YHA has a developing Historical Archive. For the past three years this has been run by three volunteers who make occasional trips to Matlock to look after the growing number of materials in this very significant collection of English and Welsh social history. I am privileged to be a member of this team. The priorities are to care for what is already there, to catalogue it (well under way) and to search out new sources of YHA archival material.

While the Archive is being set up it is not really available for public viewing, though accessibility to some of the material in the future is a point under discussion. However, we do our utmost to help with historical queries.

In the last few months large new collections have been donated to the Archive, and an excellent roomy, atmospherically stable and secure store has been made available at YHA Head Office.

The Historical Archive consists of a very large collection of photographs, drawings, slides and postcards (in the course of sorting, cataloguing and some digitising of rare items), national and regional handbooks (missing some from the 1930s) and annual reports. Regional Annual Reports before 1965 are very well represented; after that there are gaps, especially after 1972. The individual 19 regions before 1965 have patchy representation in minute books, local YHA magazines, newspaper reports and ephemera; Northumberland and Tyneside, Birmingham and London Regions are very good, for instance, while other regions such as Devon, Cornwall, Gloucester, Somerset & Exmoor, West Riding, etc., are hardly represented at all in official records. The important London Region News publication has large gaps in the sequence, particularly for later years.

There is a growing collection in the Archive catalogue of hostellers’ memories, personal logs of holidays, photographic albums of YHA activities and hostels, etc. These items are especially prized, and new material would be very welcome. There are also significant amounts of publicity material, leaflets, film strips, magazine runs and so on. (Some Rucksack Magazines, 1930s-50s, and the associated Bulletins are in short supply). There is a small collection of YHA cast triangles, signs, badges, hostel closure items, membership cards and rubber stamps, and even a remarkable professional-standard scale model of Twyssenden Manor Youth Hostel (closed 25 years ago).

Any new material for the Archive would be much appreciated (and acknowledged), and can be sent to: YHA Historical Archive, Trevelyan House, Matlock, Derbyshire, DE4 3YH. We would also welcome any ‘leads’ helping in detective work to find some of the missing regional items. Loans for the purpose of digitising could also be very useful. You can contact me through my email link below for more information.

Additionally, I am always happy to try to help with historical queries; do get in touch via my email, in the first instance.

If you have a stack of YHA memorabilia gathering dust in a corner, I’m sure the archivist (so far identified only as “John”) and his two colleagues would be happy to hear from you.

Awards season is upon us again! The rows of limos, the click of the cameras, Kate Winslet blubbing for Britain.

But it’s not just lachrymose actresses getting the red carpet treatment. Hostelworld have announced the winners of their annual Hostelworld Customer Annual Ratings – a.k.a. the HOSCARs, geddit?

Top spot goes to Travellers House in Lisbon, with two other Lisbon hostels taking second and third place. Only one HI hostel makes it into the list: YHA Rotorua Treks in New Zealand, the top-rated hostel in Oceania. The kiwi YHA must be doing something right, as last year YHA Wellington City held the same spot. There’s also a British hostel amongst the winners. Rated number four overall (and with the world’s best staff), the River House Backpackers in Cardiff sounds like it can give the local YHA alternative a run for its money.

Now all this needs to be taken with a lorry-load of salt. These awards are made on the basis of reviews entered at Hostelworld’s website. Therefore they tend to reflect the tastes of young, international backpackers, not the range of markets addressed by the YHA. Also, they tend to favour independent hostels, since many satisfied HI users will be using their own networks’ sites, or the HI site (where we already know YHA did well last year).

Still, it all serves to push hostels into the public eye. Maybe people who read about these awards in The Guardian will be inspired to brave a YHA hostel this summer, and not necessarily a New Zealand one either.

STOP PRESS: Travelbite.co.uk have just posted Hostelworld’s top ten UK hostels, and one of them’s a YHA one! The relatively new London Central YH is number 9 in the list, the only HI hostel to feature. Maybe with a full year’s voting they can challenge New Zealand next time!

A new blog post from Karl draws attention to a Get Involved in Wales event added to the programme announced in October. Ironically, the event takes place outside Wales, at Chester YH, and will be an open forum to discuss the proposed governance changes. Presumably you can turn up and raise other issues too.

The meeting will start at 12:00 on 14th February. What could be a more romantic Valentine’s Day activity than picking over the finer points of YHA’s Board of Trustees composition?

PS: If anybody attending this meeting (or any other of the Get Involved events for that matter) would like to write an account of it for this website, I’d be happy to publish it.

There will be an extra forum event on Saturday February 14th 2009, 12pm at Chester YH.

The Forum will be to discuss the proposed changes to the governance structure of YHA prior to the EGM.

The meeting is open to all former YHA Wales council members and to any other YHA member who is interested in YHA Wales.

There will be NO refreshments provided, although the self-catering kitchen will be available.

YHA are unable to provide reimbursement of travel costs or overnight accommodation for this event. If you would like overnight accommodation please contact the YHA Chester directly.

For more information on the event itself contact Wales Programme Leader Robin Pugh on 01633 613457 or by email

A historic hostel in Yorkshire’s East Riding is under threat from anti-social behaviour, according to a story in the Hull Daily Mail. Vandals attracted to a disused factory are crossing a nearby railway bridge and attacking Beverley Friary YH and its customers’ property. Matlock have apparently delivered an ultimatum:

The youth hostel at Beverley Friary is also understood to be concerned about anti-social behaviour.

Cllr Harold said: “The Youth Hostel Association has said if it gets any worse they will pull out.

One possible solution would be to remove the bridge, though that seems harsh on those that need to use it. Other possibilities include CCTV cameras or – good heavens – some policemen.

Whatever the burghers of Beverley come up with, let’s hope they’re able to swing into action before YHA makes good its threat. Beverley is a fabulous hostel: a truly historic building mentioned in the Canterbury Tales, situated in a charming little town.

If you haven’t been there yet, you might want to start making plans before it’s too late. Just be careful where you park…

Affiliated groups with a functioning email should by now have received the following invitation to this year’s conference:

Dear Affiliated Group,

The annual Affiliated Groups Conference will take place at YHA National Forest on 14th March 2009.

An invitation and a draft agenda are attached to give you more information.

Please note that conference bookings should be sent to Jeff Murry (contact details are in the attachment) and accommodation bookings at National Forest should be directed straight to the Hostel (contact details also in the attachment).

If you have any queries about the Conference arrangements, please do contact Jeff in the first instance.

The Conference is open to all Affiliated Groups and whilst each Group has just 2 votes on Motions and Elections at the meeting, you are welcome to bring as many members of your group to the meeting as you like.

Please do spread the word about the event to the other members of your group and we look forward to seeing you there.

Kind regards
Crewenna

Thanks to a grant from the Gatliff Trust, the first 30 delegates to register will get an £8 discount from one of their overnights. Since the undiscounted rate for National Forest is £22.90 pppn, that’s pretty handy. It sounds like a perfect opportunity to try out one of YHA’s shiniest and newest hostels.

Jeff Murry deserves much credit for organising and arranging this year’s conference, aided by Crewenna Dymond and other YHA staff. All it needs now is for you to turn up and make the event a success!

The Press Association are reporting some good news for YHA:

Online reservations for overnight stays in youth hostels in England and Wales have increased by nearly a third, bucking the credit crunch, it was revealed.

Hostelling International, covering youth hostel associations in more than 80 countries, said 87,123 overnight stays in England and Wales were booked on its website in 2008, a rise of 31% on the year before.

The figures were part of a total of nearly 1.4 million overnight stays in more than 4,000 youth hostels across the world booked on the website last year.

It’s not entirely clear, but I think they’re only talking about Hostelling International’s own site rather than the YHA site. These figures would thus imply a rise in overseas visitors booking UK hostels, perhaps attracted by the weak state of the pound.

Another important factor would be YHA’s widening roll-out of online booking to its hostels during the last couple of years. There were simply a whole load more beds available to be booked in 2008 compared with the year before.

That doesn’t entirely invalidate these figures though. Presumably a proportion of would-be hostellers were previously willing to book by phone or mail, or just to turn up and hope for the best. However, there must have been at least some potential customers who were lost to more web-savvy rivals. These people were spending their money with the YHA last year!

STOP PRESS: Travel industry news site eTurboNews are reporting that last year, world-wide hostel bookings reached an all time high.