Please sign in to post.

How much will your trip cost - some guidelines from Rick

None of us can accurately predict your trip cost, because so depends on choices you make re hotel and food.

Rick's opinion, published in Europe Through the Back Door 2009, is that his readership's average trip cost is about $185 per day per person, including everything except airfare.

The $185/day/person is an average: about 1/2 would be expected to have $185 or somewhat lower and 1/2 a somewhat higher cost.

The RS/ETBD $185 per person per day includes these assumptions:

a couple sharing a $150/night hotel room (thus $75/person)
breakfast included with the hotel rate
lunch $15/person
dinner $25/person
$5 misc snacks/person

The $185/person/day does not include airfare and assumes a couple staying in middle of the road hotels, eating one sit down meal per day, and traveling generally middle of the road.

Some forum members are, understandably, proud of the fact that they do trips for less than Rick's guidelines (we don't seem to hear much from those admitting they spend more than Rick's $185/day). But you may want to be cautious about making the assumption that because others, who travel in a particular way and carefully control costs, can do it for less, you can too--of course it can be done for less (see below, Rick addresses that)--but in travel it's probably true that you don't consistently get what you don't pay for.

Doing it for less means budget choices have to be made. Rick's book gives an alternative budget, for what he calls "student or rock bottom budget travelers," of about $100 to $110/person/day cost, again this includes everything except airfare. This is based on a single traveler staying in a hostel or equivalent dorm type of sleeping accommodations and being very careful about the food budget and not eating regularly in sit down restaurants. The $110-$110 figure is not an average.

Posted by
19273 posts

$185/day/person?! I find it difficult, if not impossible, to imagine spending so much. I just got back from a trip to Germany and Austria, and I spent just over $1400 for 14 days (13 + 2/2), just over $100/nt for everything (accom, meals, trans, admissions, misc), traveling by myself.

Lodging. NEVER a hostel. 3 nts hotel w/ front desk, 7 nts Privatzimmer (4 w/ bath "on floor"), 3 nts restaurant w/ rooms, 1 nt Gaestehaus. Averaged $48/nt overall, $36/nt (10) outside Munich, $73/nt (4) in Munich.

Meals. Less than $30/day. No picnics. Occasionally sandwich and drink on the go. Mostly sit down meals, lunch and dinner, in restaurants. More often Schnitzel or Wurst, no filet of beef.

Trans: $22/day. Mostly P-P tickets. Two Bayern-Tickets, one Werdenfels-Ticket, 3 MVV Tageskarten.

Note: due to variation over time in exchange rates, we should really look at Euro/day, not USD/day. I spent a whole lot less in 2000, when the Euro was $0.89 than I did on this trip.

"we don't seem to hear much from those admitting they spend more". Not on this website. There was once a discussion on Fodors about how much people spent. People were reporting spending thousand per week/person. I reported how much I typically spend and was criticized for not spending enough.

BTW, I think Rick has said that he is a cultural chameleon; when he is in Europe, he becomes a temporary European. That's the way to save money. Trying to live like an American in Europe is expensive. You'll save money if you live like a European.