9 Things That Make Stopping At The Eco Hostel On Gili Meno A Once In A Lifetime Experience

Working Working... Fire in the HOLE!!!

Location, Location, LOCATION!

Travis King

Location, location, location could definitely be 3 full reasons to find your way to the Eco Hostel on Gili Meno, but we will count it as just one for this list. The Eco Hostel is a short walk from the Ferry landing on Gili Meno, the quietest and arguably the most beautiful of the three Gili Islands of Lombok. The fire pit in the very front of the Eco Hostel hugs right up to the beach and the lapping waves of the clear blue ocean. You can look out towards the neighboring island of Gili Air from the bar and kitchen area as you swing in a hammock or lay on the star deck. If you venture straight out from the hostel with a snorkel and mask, you’ll find one of the best spots on the island to check out the beautiful reef, which is teeming with tropical fish and sea turtles slowly cruising around. Also, if you are an early riser, you can catch the sunrise every morning straight out in front of the hostel, slowly rising up over Mount Rinjani, Indonesia’s second highest peak. If you’re more of the sunset type, it’s about a ten-minute walk down the beach to the north end of the island, where you can sip on a Bintang while watching the sunset.

The Local Staff

Travis King

The local guys who staff the Eco Hostel are some of those characters you find while traveling that you will never forget. How could you forget them with names like, Hi, Rossy, Zy, and Mahsun. These guys live at the hostel (in what they call The Kingdom) and take care of everything from cleaning the grounds, to laundry to making sure the bar is fully stocked. What they are best at though, is making sure people are having a good time. Feel free to ask them for a Ukulele lesson or help with the local language. They will tell you sure, but “Pelan Pelan” (slowly slowly).

The Largest Hammock Zone in SE Asia!

Travis King

It’s hard to imagine the Rinjani Project, until you’ve seen it, and then you realize that the picture you had in your mind isn’t nearly as crazy as the actual structure itself. The Rinjani Project is what the Eco Hostel calls their Hammock Zone, which is as far as they can tell, the largest in all of SE Asia, and maybe the world!!! The Hammock Zone goes straight up to the stars, sideways, up and under, back down, and you’re never sure where it starts or ends. It’s a bit like a labyrinth, or a real life game of shoots and ladders, or an island version of a huge McDonalds play land. As construction began the idea continued to grow until in the end it became a massive bamboo structure designed to mirror the peaks of Mount Rinjani. Each peak is a platform set up with ropes to hang hammocks and lockers for your valuable stuff. Enjoy your stay in Rinjani, just make sure you remember how to find your way out!

The Bamboo Amphitheater

Travis King

Movie Night! Movie Night! Movie Night! Twice a week at the hostel there’s a group vote at the bar and a movie is projected up on the big screen in the bamboo amphitheater. Laying around on bean bags filled with Styrofoam that was collected from the beach, you can chose to watch the movie that won the vote, or to just look up at the amazing stars in the cool night time breeze, and relax among friends. If the movie you had your heart set on isn't winning the vote, don't fret. Every beer you buy gives you an additional vote, so you always have the chance to sway the outcome.

Trash Heroes and Afternoon Workshops

Travis King

Taking a vacation is nice, but traveling often brings you a bit deeper. If you enjoy connecting with the culture and land and learning as you go, the Eco Hostel will provide opportunities to dive a bit deeper. Many afternoons at the hostel you will be invited to get crafty and participate in a workshop where you will create something to contribute to the hostel, and it will usually involve salvaging waste or reusing garbage collected from the beach. Workshops include things like making tiki torches from scratch, creating mats from collected flip flops, or making decorations from seashells and Bintang bottle caps. The workshops are always fun and creative, but also just a great way to meet fellow travelers. The Eco Hostel also participates in an Asia-wide program called Trash Heroes, where once a week guests and volunteers of the hostel put on their imaginary cape and help to keep the beaches of Gili Meno clean. Depending on the week, you might join a group of volunteers in picking up the garbage that washes up on the beaches, or you might be “up-cyclying” that garbage by turning it into bean bag chairs or other functional additions to the hostel.

It's a Giant Bamboo Playground!

Travis King

The charm is in the detail. The more time you spend looking around the Eco Hostel, the more you will notice all of the intricacies and eccentric little bits and pieces of the hostel. All of the volunteers who come in and out of the hostel have added their own fingerprint in the form of new creative projects, and over time it has given the Eco Hostel a wholly unique charm. If you want to play darts, ping pong, or basketball you will find a crazy beach version here, just begging to be used. The best part is, if you want to help add to the craziness, you can!

The Bathrooms

Travis King

Bathrooms are usually part of what’s expected when you stay somewhere and generally not worth mentioning, but not at the Eco hostel. Even your waste isn’t wasted, and the experience of going to the bathroom is something entirely new. The toilets at the Eco hostel are compost toilets that have their own tropical flair, which make going to the bathroom not only memorable, but also another way you can easily help at the Eco hostel; by helping to create new fertilizer for the garden. Don't forget the sawdust!

The Village

Travis King

It takes about an hour to walk around the entire circumference of Gili Meno, where you will find resorts and ‘warungs,’ or restaurants, scattered along the white sand beach. However, if you take any of the paths that lead into the heart of the island you will find how the locals live. You will walk past chickens, goats and cows that tend to take over the road, and you will have to listen for the sound of the horse carts who carry supplies and tourists all over the island. The local people and the local food are one of the most charming parts of Gili Meno, which is still much less developed and touristic then it’s neighboring Gili Islands. The best local food I’ve found in all of Indonesia is just a 5 minute walk inland from the Eco Hostel at a little restaurant known as "Pak Man," where you will find the nicest, happiest man, cooking local dishes, like Nasi Champur, for around $1.20. Pak Man will even give you a Thai Chi massage if you ask, but be warned…these aren’t for the faint of heart.

As the slogan says, the Eco Hostel truly is “built by travelers for travelers”

Kevin Conway

When you arrive at the Eco Hostel you will see a sign asking, “Want a tour? Want to help? Want a beer?” A tour will give you a feel for the place, a beer right next to the ocean is a nice break in the day, but if you want to help, that’s when you will truly discover how the hostel became what it is today. The Eco Hostel has been open to the public for a little over a year, and throughout that time and well before the grand opening, the hostel has been designed and built entirely by travelers. Every day at the hostel you can find a crew of travelers working away on the never-ending list of projects to finish and new projects to get underway. Many of the ideas that came to fruition and created what the Eco Hostel is today came from travelers who devoted their time and talents to the hostel as volunteers. These volunteers came for the experience of working in paradise, learning something new everyday, and feeling the rewards of helping to create a hostel that is entirely original and unique to anything you will find in the rest of the world.