We really like to read about other travellers’ travel costs. Not because we are interested in anyone’s money. Simply, it help us to plan our next trips. Prices in shops and restaurants. Accomodation prices. Transport costs. For some people it might be other important stuff, like alcohol and cigarettes. How much money do I neeed to spend a week in such and such country? Travel costs records and summaries will make your planning easier. But sometimes it’s hard to find information you need on travel blogs and websites. So we decided to write about our travel costs. Here’s the first summary – from our two-week Balkans trip.
You need to remember that everyone has a different style of travelling. Some people like luxury hotels. Everything has to be clean, comfy and posh. Other people have one hundred bucks in their pocket and they will hitchhike to the end of the world. They don’t mind sleeping under the stars and wearing dirty, smelly socks. So, some will say that we spend a lot of money during our trip, and other won’t believe that it was so cheap.
I would place our travelling style somewhere in the middle. Sometimes we sleep in our tent in a forest. Sometimes we choose a clean hostel in the centre. Sometimes we hitchhike, but sometimes we take a taxi to save some time. We spend quite a lot for food and drinks (tasting of local cuisine is one of the best ways to get to know country’s culture, isn’t it?). And we love to eat, yes. We rather don’t save our money when it comes to doing some cool stuff, like rafting, paragliding or whale-watching. Memories are priceless.
Anyway, regardless your personal travel preferences, costs summaries will tell you a lot about prices in relevant country and will help you to plan your budget.
Montenegro
We flew to and fom Montenegro. Tickets Machester-Kotor costed €150 both wys for two people (EasyJet). Plus small money for bus from Bristol to Manchester. It was already a tourist season, so I think price was quite resonable.
In total, we spent €492 for 7 days in Montegro. Details beow.
WE snet the most for food, of course – €189,68, what makes 39% of all expences. We include here shopping in supermarkets, together with essentials (soap, toliet roll) and alcohol. If we break food expences nto restaurants, pubs and shops it will look like this: shops – €41,98, pubs and restaurants – €147,70.
A lot of money went to transport (€168, so 35%). We were planning less, but hitchhiking wasn’t he best and we ddn’t have much time. We were taking buses (€75 in total), and two times we were made to take a taxi (for exapl to ge to Komovi mouintains). It was another €93, but we saved a lot of time instead.
Sleeping costed a lot less- €53, what makes 11% of all Montenego expences. First night we spent ing guesthouse in Kotor (€25), andthen we paid for campings only (total €28).
For additional attractions we spent €46. Zip line was €40 (two people) and entrance to Durmitor National Park was €6.
Fr souvenirs we spent total of €9,10 and €11 for phone (local SIM card and new charger).
What we would change:
- We wouldn’teat in restaurants, as food was not good.
- We would think about renting a car. It wouldn’t decrease transport costs, but we would travel way faster, so we could see much more in 7 days than we actually did.
Albania
We took bus from Mntenegro to Albania. Official curency in Albania is lek (1 lek = appox. € 0,076), but you can pay in euros as well. We decided to pay in local currency, because that way everything was cheaper.
We spend 4 days in Albania, and we spent a total of 27 765 leks, so less than €210.
Again – we spend the greatest ammount on food – 12 465 leks, so €94, what makes almost half of the all costs. WE hardly ever shoped in markets, where we spend only 1635 leks (€12), i restaurants and pubs we spent 10 830 leków, what makes €82.
In Abania we resigned from hichhiking for buses, which were quick and cheap. For transport we paid a total of 7800 leks (€59), 6500 (€49) of which for buses and 1300 leks (€10) for taxis.
Accomodation costed 4900 leks (€37).
Other expenses are Komani lake cruise (2000 leks = €15) and anti-burns cream (600 leks = €4,5).
To see why we needed the ati-burn cream, visit this post: CLICK!
Co byśmy zrobili inaczej:
- We would stay longer!!!
Macedonia
Macedonian currency is macedonian denar (1 MKD = approx. €0,016). Again you can payi n euros, but local currency makes everything cheaper.
We spend a total of 23 254 denars, so approx. €379 for 4 days.
The biggest ammount of money we spent for paragliging (€140). It was ttally worth every enny and you can see video here: CLICK!
Food was 7359 MKD (€120), restaurants and pubs costed 6110 MKD (€100) and in shops and markets – 1249 MKD (€20).
For transport we sent 4760 MKD (€77), so more in Albania, although we were hitch-hiking, but this includes a bus from Skopje back to Montenegro (3300 MKD = €54).
Accomodation is only 8% of all expences (1780 MKD, so €29) and souvenirs 600 MKD (€10).
What we would change:
- Stay longer.
Summary
Expenses in each cuntry look as follows:
Two weeks trip for two people costed around €1083, plus €150 for flights.Total of €1233.
Is it possible to make it cheaper? Sure, don’t eat out as we did and don’t paraglide. Do more camping and hitch-hike more. We didn’t have the most valuable currency – time. That is why our costs went a lot higher than we would like it to go.
In June we will have chance to check other type of travelling. In Norway our main expense will be hired car, and beside that we plan camping only, washing in the rivers and cooking by ourselves. I can’t wait.
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