Andong Poong-gyung HOSTEL n LIBRARY

The property feels cozy and has all the proper hostel facilities, and the staff are friendly, but I can’t rate it highly because the lack of transparency is a major issue. They enforce a strict curfew, preventing anyone from entering or leaving the building between 23:00 and 8:00, and this rule also applies to common areas—essentially locking guests in their rooms. I understand that properties can have rules, yet every booking site, including this one, has a 'Policies' or 'House Rules' section where such details should be clearly stated, as this can be a huge inconvenience for travelers and is not standard practice for hotels or hostels. Discovering this after booking and paying means you have to reshuffle your entire itinerary around a curfew, which is dishonest. You can’t attend late‑night events, you must avoid early‑morning trains, and there’s no clear plan for medical emergencies. Please be honest and explicitly list these strict house rules on all booking platforms; every site has a dedicated section for this.

Nothing positive. It’s the worst option I’ve ever stayed in. First, the location is far from the city center, yet the price is inflated. The bed is terrible—worse than anything I’ve had. Apparently the hosts had bad experiences with guests who have incontinence, so they treat all guests with that suspicion. The mattress itself is fine, but on it lies a hard plastic sheet for those who relieve themselves in bed; the sheet is a torn, scratchy, polyethylene film. You cover yourself with a synthetic duvet and a synthetic pillow, so you essentially sleep inside a stiff plastic bag that makes a horrible noise with every movement, and you end up wet and sweaty all night because you’re used to cotton bedding, not synthetic. There were about ten medium‑length black hairs on the sheet, definitely not ours. The host was quite strict; it always felt like you weren’t trusted and they tried to charge extra on top of that. They feared you might wet the bed and protected it from you. Check‑in was strictly timed. The bathroom supplies were generic large packages; small personal tubes that hotels usually give for free cost extra here. Breakfast required you to come down within 30 minutes, between 8:00 and 8:30, otherwise you missed it—planning your day around that was tough. They wouldn’t let you bring coffee from their café to your room in a mug, so they poured it into a plastic cup (maybe they feared theft? You could break it in the café while carrying it to your table). Entry to the cat café was paid, even though there are just cats and kittens lounging in their chairs, nobody approaches or pets you. In short, I couldn’t relax before heading out; it’s better to book something in the city center and take a taxi than to stay in such a hostel.

The staff were very helpful and caring, and the hostel is a 15‑minute walk from the bus station, making it feel very homey for me.

Très bon logement ! Un peu excentré mais très bien fourni, la chambre et le personnel étaient vraiment tops et le café au rez-de-chaussée est 100% un atout du lieu. Cozy, bonne musique, réduction sur les boissons et possibilité de goûter à l'alcool local. Que demander de mieux ? Ah oui, il ferme à 23h, c'est idéal pour se poser après une journée de visite 😌 Je recommande à 100%, même si le réseau de bus rend les déplacements parfois difficiles par son imprévisibilité. Bon voyage à Andong !

This place is truly one of a kind—a library‑café full of cats with a guesthouse upstairs. The entire staff was incredibly friendly and helpful, and the rooms were cozy and comfortable. The location is a bit tricky, tucked out in the fields, but if you turn left when you find a bus stop you’ll be on the right track. It’s very quiet, yet you’re only a 10‑minute walk from the train and bus station, so all the surrounding areas are accessible. It was a fantastic experience.