<p>This might be a dumb question, but I’m trying to come up with a ballpark budget number for a trip to Europe. One stop would probably be Sweden, which I hear is super expensive, but one of the kids will be there next spring for study abroad.</p>
<p>My hubby is gung-ho on the idea of going, but money’s tight & I’m trying to make a rough estimate to see if it is even possible to think about it, and have an idea how much we’d need to set as a savings goal.</p>
<p>Just wondered if there are any calculators or resources that might offer budgeting advice? Or maybe the only way is to develop an itinerary and price it all out?
Any advice, experienced travelers?</p>
<p>It’s not too hard once you break down the major components and fill in the blanks then do the math.</p>
<ul>
<li>Flights</li>
<li>Rental Car plus gas if applicable (or trains and other transport)</li>
<li>Lodging</li>
<li>Food</li>
</ul>
<p>Those are the major categories but what to put in the blanks can vary tremendously depending on where you’re going, where you’ll stay, etc. The hotel costs can vary a lot depending on the part of town you stay in, the type of hotel, whether it’s a 5 star, 2 star, etc. or whether it’s a B&B. To get an idea of lodging you can look up some prices for hotels for the specific places you’ll be on any of the travel sites (expedia, orbitz, etc.) but might also want to search for B&Bs which can be cheaper there than hotels.</p>
<p>Don’t assume that once you have the cost of the flights covered you’re mostly taken care of because the other costs can add up quickly.</p>
<p>1> Travel off season–this can cut your expenses in half
2> If possible, concentrate on one or two spots, rent an apartment in each and make side trips. For example, our last trip to Paris we stayed in a centrally located apartment for 750 EU per week. From Paris we took side trips to Normandy, Chartre, Dijon all via train. :. Enjoy the life of the locals, shop for meals in markets and use mass transit.
3> Don’t try to see everything in one trip</p>
<p>In Sweden, the food is super expensive, though not as expensive as in Norway. Take a suitcase full of granola bars along to eat as snacks so you don’t have to buy as much food. That’s what I think I’ll do next time, anyway, if there is a next time. Also, stay at hotels that have breakfast included in the price. The breakfast buffets are wonderful, and if you eat hearty, you can skimp on lunch. A lot of people make sandwiches at breakfast to take along for lunches. Sweden is wonderful. Try to go if you can.</p>
<p>The other option on food is to visit a local grocery store and buy some food there, just like the locals do, as opposed to eating every meal in a restaurant or too many meals in fancy restaurants. Even in Sweden one can buy a loaf of bread, cheese, etc. and make sandwiches if they want to. It can also be interesting to compare their stores to the ones you’re used to here.</p>
<p>I travel quite a bit in Europe and find that Sweden has the highest food costs. (hotels also fairly high, but London is worse). Transportation is also expensive in Sweden - the high speed train from the airport to downtown is over $60 each way. The bus is about 40% of that. </p>
<p>There is a cheap sushi place just a few blocks from Stockholm’s central station - under $20 you get 30 pieces of sushi, salad & miso soup. Even though I’m on an expense account, I typically go there if I have a open meal on my semi-annual trips.</p>
<p>Since your kid will be in Sweden, and possibly ready for a break by the time you get there, you might want to meet him/her in another less expensive locale. Go somewhere new and different for everyone. Inter-city European airfares are very cheap. And if you have an apartment, there would be plenty of room to share!</p>
<p>I was just in Sweden and it cost $100 to fill the gas tank of a very small Hyundai…ouch ! yes the food is pricey and I like the previous suggestions to take advantage of the hotel breakfasts and pack some granola bars or another type of packable no perishable snacks.
We took an overnight ferry trip to Oslo and ate on the boat for breakfast…weren’t hungry thankfully while we spent the day there because two diet cokes cost us $12
If you are booking hotels ahead of time , take a minute to see if the price includes breakfast…it used to be standard , but not anymore.
I might also suggest that you contact your credit card companies to not only let them know you are traveling to whatever countries you go to , but get PIN numbers because my husband had one hell of a time using his cards over there without them.</p>
<p>For a quick upper estimate of your trip cost, pay a visit to a travel agency, and ask about tours of Sweden. Or better yet, see if one of them will put a travel package together for you to consider. If you like what you see, you canto for it. If it seems high, you can check for similar lower priced options. I saved a bundle on a couple of big trips this way.</p>
<p>I think you budget to be about 1/2 of a COA for attending a private college for 4 adults for 2 weeks. Nothing fancy. But the cost of booking 2 hotel rooms for 4 adults is very expensive.
Here is rough break down: $6000/air fare, $200/day for reasonably hotel, $200/day for food, adding in shopping, transportation, and spending money and it could be $16K-$20K for 4 adults easily.</p>
<p>$200/day for food is too much. It’s easy enough to spend that much if one tries but also easy to reduce it if one tries including doing what I said about stopping at a grocery or even deli and picking up some food that way to take care of some of the meals or even hitting some fast food places, including local ones.</p>
<p>The European hotels drive me crazy. They generally sell their rooms by the ‘single’, ‘double’, or ‘triple’ and if you have 4 people they expect you to simply get 2 rooms - at their ridiculous room rates. There are some hotels that have quad rooms which makes it more reasonable but you really need to search these out. B&Bs can usually handle 4 people less expensively as well but I don’t know about B&Bs in Sweden - I only stayed at hotels there.</p>
<p>It can be very expensive because of the current poor exchange rate, but the costs can be kept down with a lot of planning. Last summer my family of 3 flew from Los Angeles to Paris, where we spent 2 weeks in Paris, 2 weeks in Italy, and 2 weeks in Austria/Germany. The trip cost us a total of $12-13,000. One tip, assuming you have children, is to try and stay in American chains where children stay free. We paid as little as $50 a night at Holiday Inn and Holiday Inn Express. I have also done well using Priceline.</p>
<p>post #14. It’s not a lot. It works out to be 31 pounds a day(assume $1.6/1 pound) including breakfast, lunch, dinner for 4 adults. The cheapest Holiday Inn was 80 pound a night for one hotel room. Again it depends on the place in Europe.</p>
<p>Do not lose your rental car key! We did this in Italy on a holiday weekend (Christmas/New Years and it was a nightmare. We had to travel all day to Rome, stay overnight, buy new expensive tickets and then spend big$$ getting our bags (locked in the trunk) home. Took weeks. We are experienced travelers and this still felt impossible. If you rent a car, ask for an extra key and keep the two in different locations.</p>
<p>Yes, sometimes travel agencies have considerably more leverage and can get better deals than we can by ourselves. It’s good to see what the agency can put together, just to have something to weigh against.</p>
<p>Read Rick Steves’ “Europe through the Back Door.” It has many money saving ideas and the info you are looking for.</p>
<p>He suggests $120/person/day, double occupancy, plus airfare. Bit more in expensive countries. And no, he is not talking about staying in hostels.</p>
<p>We just bought $650 tickets JFK-Brussels for June. You can then fly Brussels to most any city for <$100 each way.</p>
<p>I’m sure he has more info on ricksteves.com</p>
<p>Especially appreciate the heads up on things like cost of food etc in Sweden. That’s the kind of variable I was not sure how to budget for. I like the idea of getting an apartment for a week, maybe. Cooking some meals in would help a bit. It needs to be on the lower end of the spectrum for us to consider. Would rather not go than go and wind up with a looming credit card bill due to unexpected expenses! I am kinda miserly, just hate debt of any kind.</p>
<p>Anyone have experience with Copenhagen? Is it just as expensive there as Sweden? We were thinking of a few days there as well, perhaps.</p>