The youth hostel in Brussels, for instance, will see its shortage of beds alleviated with 52 additional beds, increasing its capacity to 187. The city of Bruges will receive a new youth hostel boasting 120 beds, which is twice as much as the current offering. The city of Hasselt will receive its first youth hostel ever and Brasschaat near Antwerp will receive a youth residential centre with 120 beds in the vicinity of the sports hotel. The antiquated youth hostel in Kortrijk will be renovated and extended to accommodate 120 overnighters and the Ploate in Ostend will relocate to the current Admiral Hotel and an adjoining warehouse.

The work is scheduled to take place between 2012 and 2015. While they’re at it, they might want to spend a bob or two on the Flemish Hostel Fedration’s rather ancient website too!

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Each member of the team is looking to raise at least £2000, every penny of which will go directly towards ensuring those that have suffered the loss of a serving loved one can begin the process of re-building their lives. Team member Tom Hodgson says:

I am doing this physically demanding bike ride because I want to make a difference to these families who have given up a member of their family to keep us safe back here at home. No one wants to be in their situation and this is the least I can do for them. The money we raise will enable these families to spend a week away with other families in the same situation to support each other, take some time out and have fun doing all sorts of activities

The YHA team consists of:

• Mick Horan – Operations Director
• Simon Ainley – Fundraising Development Manager
• Simon Brister – Property Manager
• Tom Hodgson – Design & Communications Assistant
• Lewis Johnson – Manager, YHA Manchester

You can click on any of the names above to sponsor that rider via the Virgin Money Giving website, or just send a cheque payable to “YHA – Family Activity Breaks” to Hannah Curzon, YHA, Dimple Road, MATLOCK, DE4 3YH.

One of the other riders taking part (like the camps themselves, this ride is a joint effort between YHA and the MoD), Lou O’Connell, is writing a blog of her progress training for and taking part in the ride. Of course, you can sponsor her too.

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The first camps took place last year, at Coverack and Whitby, and combine outdoor activities with counselling support, and the chance to meet other families in the same situation. One of the first attendees, whose 18-year-old son died in Afghanistan last year, described the scheme thus:

I had an absolutely fantastic time with my children on a FAB holiday last year. My son had died only seven weeks before we went on the holiday, and for my younger children aged only four and five at the time – those weeks had been a particularly traumatic and confusing time.

Being able to go on holiday made all the difference. They benefited hugely from spending time with children of all ages who had suffered a similar loss, and we could spend time together as a family for the first time in weeks. It was an overwhelmingly positive experience I will never forget.

Last week it was announced that the camps would continue this year on an expanded basis, with spaces for up to 100 families at Conwy and Cairngorm in addition to the original two venues.

It’s terrible that such things are needed, but I’m really proud of the YHA for getting involved.

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How welcome, then, to find on my doormat a new incarnation of an old friend. The new YHA News is a twelve-page colour newsletter combining news from the network and features about hostelling at home and abroad. It’s still a piece of marketing of course, but it feels more like a magazine and less like a sales brochure than Discover ever did.

Of particular interest to readers of this site is a letter from Margaret Bray, now living in New Zealand, remembering her days in an (unnamed) YHA Local Group just after the war:

For Ken and me, with no secure home life, our local Youth Hostels association groups which sprang up after the war became family, and for many other teenagers feeling similarly displaced. Several members, like us, came from broken homes, a few were young men demobbed from the armed forces, most of us probably feeling a bit lost after six fractured years of war. We met socially every Thursday night in a nearby hall. Spare cash was non-existent, but Youth Hostels were cheap We democratically organized ourselves with a committee and a constitution. We organized our own programmes.

Thriving from the friendship, we hostelled by either biking or walking as a group almost every weekend and summer holiday, leaving bombed out London behind to explore the English countryside. We’d wander down to the village pub in the evening, making a glass of sweet-and-sour cider, or a glass of beer last all the evening before going back to our dormitories. We even spent our Christmasses together at a hostel despite them closing between ten and five. We went for walks round the villages to fill in those winter hours outdoors and made our own simple fun in the evenings with games, ghost stories, or playing cards. On Christmas Eve we went to the poorly attended midnight service in those old village churches, often doubling the congregation, to the vicar’s delight.

We looked out for each other, affirmed each other, knew the good and bad sides of us all. More like brothers and sisters really. After all not much glamour remains after hours of cycling, walking or climbing in pouring rain, or coping with punctures, tiredness, grumpiness, sunburn or getting lost. My father always thought, wrongly, that we were “up-to-no-good” but romance did of course eventually blossom, and thirteen couples married in our early twenties, almost all proving successful and rewarding.

An experience not entirely unrecognisable to YHA group members today, I think. It’s just a shame that they fail to point out that hostelling groups aren’t some vanished artefact of the 1940s and 50s, but alive and well and meeting in a town near you! Oh well, maybe next issue.

An accompanying questionnaire invites feedback on YHA’s communcations, and what you’d like to read about in the future. All-in-all, I think this marks a very promising development in YHA’s relationship with its members.

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Friday 26th March

19:00 onwards

Arrival and Registration

During evening

Meet and Greet / socialise

Saturday 27th March

8:30

Breakfast

9:00

Day delegates arrival and registration

9:30

Opening Address – Jeff Murry, COPSE

1. Welcome and introductions
2. Warden of National Forest YH
3. Order of Agenda

9:40

Apologies for absence

9:45

Minutes of Previous Conference (circulated to groups previously)

1. Accuracy (to be notified to Chairman prior to meeting)
2. Matters Arising from the minutes

9:55

Fundraising – John Adams

10:30

Tea / Coffee Break

11:00

Key Speaker – Caroline White, YHA Chief Executive

12:00

Lunch – provided by hostel

13:00

Election of Representatives to 2010 Company AGM

13:15

Presentation of Presidents Award – Paul Madge, Stafford Group

13:40

Winning Groups talk about the categories they won

14:00

Proposals for future Presidents Awards – Paul Madge, Stafford group

14:20

Constitution – Alan Summers, Leicester Group

15:00

Motions to 2009 Company AGM

15:30

Open Forum

15:50

Date of Next Conference / Closing Notices

16:00

Close

Sunday 28th March

10:00

Walk – 7-8 miles led by Leicester Group

As I noted last week, delegates should be able to take advantage of the YHA Bed Sale and stay for just £9.95 a night, making it a cheap weekend as well as (I’m sure) an interesting one. I’m particularly looking forward to hearing from Caroline White. It’ll be the Chief Executive’s first official contact with groups (and vice versa), and an important chance to make a good impression.

If you have a motion to submit to the AGM, or other comments on the agenda, you should contact Jeff by email. Of course, you should also feel free to leave a comment here!

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Top-rated hostel, for the second year running, is the Travellers House in Lisbon. The Portuguese capital seems to be the place to go hostelling – the top three hostels, and half of the top ten, are located in the city.

Closer to home, the best UK hostel (ranked 6th in the world) is the River House Backpackers in Cardiff. Tipped off about the award, The Guardian paid them a visit. It sounds great:

Our quarters are fitted out with a bunk bed (albeit a brand new one), sheet sleeping bags and a stripped wooden floor, which makes us feel less guilty about booking a twin room rather than a dorm.

Elsewhere, there are eight sparkling showers and loos, a spotless kitchen with all mod cons, and a patio out back where you can sit at a table with an endless supply of free tea and coffee. The TV room is packed with DVDs and a Wii, there’s a free internet, WiFi throughout, and the dining room is strewn with bowls piled high with fruit.

All for around the same price as the YHA alternative.

There’s good news for the YHA in the results too, though. London Central YH, which was in 9th place in the UK list last year, has risen to 8th place this year. Not a stellar performance perhaps, but steady progress in the right direction. Let’s hope they can rise further in the year ahead.

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Just make your booking, via the web site or central booking, before 31st March using the special code 995Beds-en1. Oddly, there’s no mention of this offer on the YHA website’s front page or special offers page, why have a sale and not tell everyone about it? However, a little Googling soon turns up the full details.

If you’re looking for a way to use this offer, how about coming to the YHA Groups Conference at National Forest next month? £9.95 a night is less than half price!

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Work can now continue to the next stage:

The organisations that will operate in the granary can now gain access and begin internal work. Interpretive panels are also to be put up to show how the granary operated and explain its significance to Berwick’s history and heritage, including one on a rail line within the site and the part it played in the whole operation.

All work should be completed by the autumn of this year and it is hoped the site will be open to the public early in 2011.

I’m glad to see information panels forming part of the plan: it’s a chance to make the most of a historic site, and I’ve seen them work really well at Whitby and Wooler for example.

Roll on 2011!

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Sadly the hostel closed in 2006, following a (probably correct) YHA decision to concentrate on sites closer to the centre of the city. However, now you have the opportunity to stay there again…

Country Life report that the property is on the market, having been split into six luxury properties (4 in the original building, 2 new ones built in the garden). The place, now called Wellgarth Manor, has been somewhat upgraded from its hostelling days:

All the joinery, fitted desks, dressers, bedside tables and wardrobes have been custom made. Spacious kitchens feature Poggenpohl units, stone work surfaces and Gaggennau appliances. Bathrooms have limestone flooring and walk-in showers. The master bathroom suites have his and her shower areas, Kaldewei baths with whirlpool Jacuzzi and chromatherapy systems. There is an integrated audio system throughout each property and Aquavision monitors can be found in the guest and master bathrooms.

All formal reception areas have hard word flooring. The properties feature cinema rooms with a bar, full High Definition projectors, screens with 17.1 surround sound and blu-ray players.

The price has gone up a bit too – prices range from £3,750,000 to £5,250,000. You could have stayed there for about 500 years for that money at YHA’s old overnight rates, albeit without the benefit of fancy kitchen units or tellys in the bathroom.

If you have that kind of money to spend, or just like to pretend that you have, take a look at this glossy brochure to see what’s on offer.

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• Best Hostel 2009: HI Baan Dinso, Bangkok, Thailand
• Friendliest Hostel 2009: Tønsberg, Norway
• Most Comfortable Hostel 2009: Kyoto – Utano, Japan
• Most Efficient Hostel 2009: Eastham (Mid Cape), USA
• Cleanest Hostel 2009: Grindelwald, Switzerland
• Best Hostel Country 2009 – Luxembourg

The awards are based on the customer ratings in each category, as entered by people who booked hostels through the HI site (you can’t vote if you booked in some other way). Hostels also needed to have had at least 50 votes between 1st November 2008 and 1st October 2009.

Unlike the “HOSCARs”, there’s no continent-by-continent breakdown, so it’s hard to tell how far down the leaderboard the YHA’s hostels are. Maybe, with the benefit of a full year’s votes, could we see one of YHA’s London flagships on this list next year?

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