Backpackers inn packs it in
Hostel once voted continent’s best makes way for 41-storey condo
Beds that once welcomed travellers seeking adventure will now serve travellers seeking safety and refuge.
Once voted the best hostel on the continent, the Canadiana Backpackers Inn, in the Entertainment District, is closing in less than two weeks to make way for a planned 41-storey condo development, and the owner is donating furniture to Syrian refugees.
Chris Morgan gave a surplus of 40 bunk beds to a church in Guelph sponsoring 76 Syrian families, who are expected to move to the area this year, said Jaya James, the executive director of the Refugee Sponsorship Forum.
“We were really excited because probably one of the most challenging things to acquire is bunk beds,” she said, adding that they are in high demand among large families on shoestring budgets.
Less practical furniture, such as the stuffed moose head and lake trout that gave the hostel a distinctly Canadian air, was sold online.
“François Le Pen,” a four-foot-tall wooden bear who once left the lobby to go on a pub crawl with guests, is moving to another hostel — farther from the downtown clubs, but a stone’s throw from the Kensington Market bars.
Morgan opened the hostel, on Widmer St. just north of Adelaide St. W., after spending a decade backpacking, including stints meditating in India, teaching English in Hong Kong and picking oranges in Greece, he said. He bought the row of Victorian townhouses in 1997 with his late father John, a comic and writer on CBC’s Royal Canadian Air Farce, who was known for playing the dopey “Mike from Canmore.”
The hostel had only two beds when Morgan welcomed his first guest in 1999. Eventually, it grew to a maximum occupancy of 200 in private rooms, and fourand eight-person dorms.
In 2004, the inn was voted the best hostel in North America by hostelworld.com, a service that helps travellers book hostels worldwide. Customers graded it on character, security, location, staff, cleanliness and fun.
Some travellers made themselves so comfortable at the hostel that they stayed much longer than expected. Kate Williams, a 23-year-old from Preston, England, came to the inn in November and now works at reception. “It’s the only other place that I’ve walked into, other than my house, that feels like home,” she said. She pays about $450 a month for a shared room.
Morgan knew it was time to sell the property when he reached the age of his typical guests’ parents, he said. “Owning a hostel is a bit like organizing a party, and you can’t really enjoy it because you have to keep an eye on the furniture,” he told the Star.
But it also had its perks. Morgan has met an array of colourful travellers who have come through the inn. A few years ago, a gang of graduates arrived from the posh English private school Eton, who wanted to recreate Jack Kerouac’s journey through North America. Their plans were cut short when they were turned away at the New York border after authorities found a joint in their van.
Morgan also remembers a Brit who was blind and partially deaf, but didn’t let his disabilities keep him from skydiving, bungee-jumping or acquiring a degree in American history.
“The great ones inspire you to do stuff,” Morgan said.
Some guests fell in love with Toronto during their stays. And a few travellers fell in love with each other. The current manager, away on maternity leave, met her husband there, Morgan said.
“The staff, some of them have worked here for a long, long time, so it’s kind of like disbanding a family.” With files from Louise Brown and Peter Edwards