The shelter
The shelter is in the courtyard of our own building, about a minute away. It is open during alerts.
There is a shelter in the building courtyard. An alternative is Zoloti Vorota metro (about 12 minutes on foot).
The alternative is Zoloti Vorota metro station, about 12 minutes on foot. The Kyiv metro doubles as a shelter, and this is our nearest station.
Where the entrance is and how it opens will be shown to you at check-in. It takes a minute, and seeing it once beats reading a description.
At night
An alert can come at three in the morning. Here is what is already in place for that:
- You have your own key to the hostel. The doors are not locked for the night, and nobody decides for you when you may leave.
- The owner lives here, behind the next door. This is not a 24-hour reception, but it is a person in the building rather than a support chat.
- The hostel is small: four rooms, and everyone sees everyone. You will not find strangers off the street in the corridor at night.
Who can actually get in
Only checked-in guests get a key to the entrance, and reception keeps an eye on the door. Nobody walks in off the street.
CCTV covers the common areas only: the entrance, the corridor and the kitchen. There are no cameras in the rooms or the bathroom.
Curfew and arriving late in the evening
Kyiv has a curfew and its hours change from time to time. Check the current hours before you travel — that is a decision of the city authorities, not a rule of ours.
Standard check-in is from 13:00 to 22:00. Arrival after 22:00 is possible by prior arrangement.
If your train or bus arrives late, write in advance. We will arrange it and someone will let you in.
Why quiet is a safety question here too
Quiet hours from 22:00 to 07:00 are not an aesthetic. When nobody is partying next to you, you hear the siren, you hear the stairwell, and you wake up for the things worth waking up for.
There is no alcohol or drugs inside. That removes most of the scenarios that make a hostel restless at night.
How quickly you can reach someone
You can reach a person between 08:00 and 23:00. That is a window when someone answers, not a promise to reply within a minute.
Write to say roughly when you will arrive and someone will meet you at the entrance.
Great hostel! I have stayed at 5 hostels during my stay in Ukraine, this is much better than all the other ones. Great host too, excellent English speaker. Also very caring, I had forgotten to tell him I was out of town for a night, he reached out to make sure I was safe. I will return.
— Anna, Sweden · Booking.com
What we do not promise
Plainly, so you decide with your eyes open:
- We do not guarantee your safety. Nobody in a country at war can, and anyone promising otherwise is misleading you.
- The courtyard shelter is a shelter, not a certified bomb shelter. We describe it as it is and no further.
- There is no 24-hour reception. The owner lives next door, but he is one person, not a staffed shift.
- We offer no response-time guarantee. Messages are usually answered within the day.