Portree Hostel

**We have a space available from the 7th December until 23rd December but otherwise we are looking for volunteers for January, February and March 2019*** We are a hostel and guesthouse in Waterford city in the sunny south-east of Ireland. Waterford is the oldest city in Ireland (1100 years old!) - it's an hour and three quarters from both Cork and Dublin and well served by rail and buses. The city itself has lots of festivals and plenty to see and do. Nearby there are some of Ireland's nicest beaches and surf spots at Tramore and Dunmore East. The property is split between a hostel and a guesthouse and we are looking for help with all aspects of the place - cleaning, changing beds, laundry, reception and very importantly, talking and socialising with the guests. Sometimes we also need help with basic maintenance (painting & decorating etc.). Other than that a big part of the placement is to look after the guests and be sociable with them (invite them to play cards if you're playing, or out to the pub if you're going out). We want guests (and of course helpers) to find our hostel a friendly place and to have a great experience in Waterford and having friendly helpers is a really important part of that. Otherwise we do expect volunteers to look after areas when they're in them (so if there are dirty dishes in the kitchen or a bin needs to be emptied we expect volunteers to look after those issues). This part of the job probably only takes 5 minutes a day but is really critical as we need all areas to be nice and clean and looking well for the guests. We also require all volunteers to speak English (you don't need perfect English but we don't like guests feeling excluded from conversations so require helpers to attempt to speak English). If you would like to apply, please let us know when you think you would like to come, and also if you have any specific skills that might be useful - we're keeping an open mind. We generally ask for between 3 and 6 weeks from volunteers but for December and January we can take people for a shorter period (minimum 1 week). The help is 4 hours a day, 5 days per week (some weeks we may need you to work an extra day but you'll get the extra day off the next week if that happens - at the end of the month everyone has their first and last days free as well as eight others). We can only take people with EU passports or valid work visas for Ireland - please confirm in your application that you have one or other of these (otherwise we will assume you don't and will have to decline your application) We prefer people travelling solo as we've found they soicalise with the guests more - we do occasionally take pairs of friends but not couples I'm afraid. Thanks!

You will get a bed and basic breakfast (toast, cereal etc) every day, - we provide ingredients for dinner every day (as long as someone wants to cook) and have communal meals with staff and guests, with the cooking being rotated among the helpers - there's no hassle if you can't cook but we would like if you could help in some way (cleaning / chopping veg etc). Beds are in a shared room with other staff. The staff room is mixed occasionally. Otherwise, we will do whatever we can to make your trip to Waterford as enjoyable as possible. Since the dynamic of the hostel & guesthouse changes all the time (we started the project 3 and a half years ago but it's changed a lot over that period), it's hard to know exactly how things will be, but we think is an enjoyable opportunity for someone looking to see the South East of Ireland and help with what we think is a fun, sociable place to work. You'll definitely learn something - apart from improving your English volunteers have fun and hang out together and tend to learn lots from each other - how to cook weird dishes from each others countries, how to play guitar, how to draw, paint, etc etc etc.