TMax-n-Topo's Hostel — Hotel in Town of North Elba

never did a hostel before but solid place overall, within 20 minutes from a good amount of peaks. we were in the first bunk (bunks are all downstairs while private ones upstairs) and four people live on one bigger side with a table and fifth bed while the other four live on a smaller room separated by a curtain. one issue is it seems the bigger room’s thermostat controls whether we can use the smaller room’s thermostat. before you leave your hostel for events, we were told by topo himself to leave it at 57-60 degrees. when you raise it to 70 and as it starts out so low and there's only a tiny base heater in the smaller room, it can take 30 mins minimum to raise it up, and sometimes a good hour or more. the thermostat was also glitchy at times so we had to control the temp on the main room in order for ours to function sometimes.

right now, the third bathroom is getting its showerhead repaired but hopefully that is done soon. you get a very tiny soap bar (you can take multiple, but you start out with one) and a very big towel and that towel must last you for the entirety of your trip it seems, for us it was 3-4 days.

many visitors seem to get take out food so the fridge had space for my group that preferred to cook from scratch but keep that in mind. whatever is not needed at the end of your trip can get a round sticker placed on it to label it as anyone’s to take (some stickers will have price tags, use them anyways because no one pays for them, that’s just how the stickers came). that said, the soda and snacks near the entertainment section does require cash payments.

speaking of, locker rooms in the hostel are located within your bunk and are $3 a day or stay, forgot which. there are no locks to the rooms or keycards in the bunks. the bunks are quite low so that they’re difficult to sit up on (compared to a college bunk) without hitting your head so be aware, and i’m 5’7”. as i mentioned the kitchen, things to note that tissue rolls, napkins, and aluminum foil were nowhere to be found but maybe this is a norm for hostels? i was offering personal napkins to the community storage area but otherwise it seemed we had to bring our own.

good place overall, topo knows a lot about the peaks so ask him for all that if...

I cannot recommend this place due to extreme unprofessionalism. I only stayed one night here. David charged me for two nights. He also tried charging me a week or two PAST the date that I stayed. I’ve never encountered a place that does that. He texted me saying my payment didn’t go through (which it would’ve if he charged it in time. Since it was a gift card - he didn’t charge it before I spent the rest.) and so I called him to give a different card number. He said I stayed two nights and I said I stayed only one night. He said on the phone with an attitude that he’d charge for 1 night, but I couldn’t do this again in the future. Do what? Get charged for the accurate amount of days I stayed? I thought that was that but then he sent me a text saying he charged for 2 nights since it says that in his files. Now I had to call him again. On the phone with him, he said I stayed this past weekend when in reality I stayed there several weeks ago. He was quite defensive about this whole thing. I told him I don’t need to cheat him out of $35 if that’s what he thinks I’m doing. He said I emailed him. I searched my emails and didn’t see anything that I sent to him so I asked what email, and he read out a completely different email address. I said that’s not my email and also this whole thing was quite unprofessional. Then he started looking up the call logs to see when I called back then, which makes no sense because there is no way to tell if I called to place a reservation or just to inquire about staying. So now he realized he’s confused my name with someone else who stayed there. Great. Thanks for charging me for your mistake and being so defensive over the phone about it. Although my mood is now soured, he refunded the overcharged...

Dh and I have driven by this hostel hundreds of times, but never stayed there until this past Saturday night (we usually go to the area as a day trip, but decided to stay overnight to be able to get parking early at the Adirondack Loj parking area).||||We stayed in the Dixies motel type room on the top floor. The room is very spacious and has 2 double beds and a single bed, as well as a table, chairs, fridge and microwave and bathroom with a shower. It's very cozy, clean and comfortable. ||||The owner's sister was there while the owners were on vacation, and she showed me around the place, including the bunk rooms in the basement, where I would definitely stay if I was in the area on my own. ||||On the main floor there's a large kitchen for everyone to use, including those in the 2 private rooms upstairs. There's also a large dining area with 5 big tables, and an attached living room area, with sofas and chairs and tables. There are a ton of books in various libraries, games, guitars, and some snacks to purchase. In the basement there are 3 separate and locking showers and toilets for the bunk bed rooms to use.||||It was fun since you're not alone, tucked away in your hotel room. The main room has lots of friendly people to chat with and some were playing guitar. Early Sunday morning I used the kitchen to prepare our breakfasts and lunch for our hike. The age range was from 20's to 60's, so a varied group of people, mostly hikers, but not all.||||The price is very reasonable, and as the title states, I will definitely stay again next time we decide to overnight...