We’re well into our travels and 4 months have gone by so fast! Too fast, in fact! I think we’re completely adapting and loving our nomadic life. Alas we can’t go on forever given this is a mini retirement so we most certainly need to get back to working and earning more. We’ve also spent more than expected, boo!
Ready for some numbers? In total, our 4 months on the road has cost us a whopping SGD26,452.80. That is about SGD6,600 per month and SGD222.29 per day! Without the cost of connections between countries and cities, our daily cost of living has been SGD131.59 per day. Not at all what we had hoped for! Reality can bite at times 😉
Back when we thought this would be a Europe trip, we stuck a finger in the air and guessed hovering SGD133 a day for a 6 month trip. Hmm, freaky!
Yes we tracked every cent and glad we did because we have underestimated that number before the trip AND if we didn’t have proof of it, we would have thought we spent less. We can’t emphasize this enough, track your expenses. Without any form of tracking, you have no real idea what you are spending and how much it sets you back!
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Clearly, Europe was pretty expensive from a cost per day perspective and this should come as no shock! Eating out cost a lot more and accommodation was also much more expensive over there, averaging SGD88 – SGD96 per night. We used AirBnB a whole lot as it’s much cheaper than hotels and even Booking.com in this instance.
If you are new to AirBnB, here’s our referral link so you get a certain amount of credits from your first booking (it keeps changing from SGD26 to SGD63). In return, we get a small referral credit from AirBnB for spreading the good word and trust us, we wouldn’t share it unless it’s worth sharing.
We thought our cost of living would be significantly lower in South America and we were delighted to see that was the case! Again it should come as no shock that Galapagos (we separated this from Ecuador as it’s quite distinctive from Ecuador, cost-wise) was expensive but not really the way you think it is! You can get by pretty cheap on the food and accommodation front. What really drove our costs up were our activities! We dived a lot and it was between USD120-170 a pop. Expensive hobby, expensive holiday!
Peru is in line with what we’ve researched and wonderfully cheap but the very pleasant surprise for us was the cost of living in Argentina. We have been eating really well (averaging SGD36/day) and staying in very modern apartments (averaging SGD32/day) for not very much! In fact, early in our travel in South America, we actually stayed in hostels to meet other travelers and it cost almost the same as an entire apartment here in Argentina.
Related Post: 11 Galapagos Tips that Would Save You a Tonne of Cash and Our Personal Picks!
So in the pie chart, we’ve included the cost of connections between countries and cities so you can categorically see which bucket of expenses are the biggest. Travel between countries and cities add SGD7,760 to our overall cost (included within the total cost of SGD26,452 shared above) and this is with our flights to Portugal covered by miles!
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We’ve actually flown a lot more than we thought we would! Sometimes out of necessity, some times out of want. We had intended to take the land transport between Quito, Ecuador to Lima, Peru and stop along the way however there were protests in Ecuador to the point a state of emergency was declared and we felt the best option was to parachute out of the country, ASAP! Imagine being stranded with the kids as the roads were blocked and buses were not running! We booked flights almost immediately and managed some good rates. A problem that money can solve!
Given that we are travelling pretty much on the fly as well, planning it by the week, we haven’t taken advantage of lower fares by booking earlier. Flexibility has a price! It’s been cheaper, faster and definitely more manageable with the kids. It’s more expensive, no doubt, however worth avoiding the hassle of being on a bus with kids for 24-48 hours. Sometimes, it’s nice to be nearly financially independent. Ok, it’s always nice 🙂
As we alluded to earlier, accommodation / lodging has been a mix of hostels, apartments to ourselves and shared apartments. We always check on AirBnB and Booking.com to find the best fit for us and our wallets. We’re pleased with spending only SGD5,170 over 4 months. That is much cheaper than living in Singapore 🙂
Eating out has been really great as well and we’ve had a good mix of eating frugally and splurging. We don’t head to the fanciest, hardly ever, but we do have some nice meals and surprisingly this has not been too expensive. Over 4 months, eating out has averaged SGD31.75 per day and we tend to eat out at least a meal a day.
Related:
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Activities have been expensive, especially in South America. Everything is in the hundreds. Where possible, we’ve done independent travel and treks however it’s not always what we fancy with the kids or when we are doing it solo. As an example, the Salkantey Trek set us back approximately SGD255 a person. We absolutely could have done it without a tour but since we were doing it without our partner, we decided against it to be safe. You can’t put a price on safety, now can you?
Groceries have been wonderfully cheap in almost all the countries. Europe certainly had fresher greens and a wider selection, especially on the dairy products. South America gets better with the freshness and availability of options as you head south, from what we have experienced.
Taxi costs has been quite an interesting amount to look at and a classic example of how small things add up! We’ve been quite happy with taking Uber whenever we decide not to walk, it’s cheap and good. It’s usually the airport runs that hike this category up for an average ride in all the South American countries has been SGD8. Uber has been a good friend to us in terms of the value it gives. As a category of expense, a slight ouch!
If you are new to Uber, here’s our referral link so you get a certain amount of credit from your first booking (it keeps changing). In return, we get a small referral credit from Uber for spreading the good word and trust us, we wouldn’t share it unless it’s worth sharing.
Pre-trip expenses refer to the cost for our travel insurance and vaccinations required before travelling to South America. The other categories are not too significant and some are one-off expenses. We haven’t had to incur any visa cost (hurray for our passports!) except for entry fees to Galapagos. Telco cost refers to the amounts we have paid for local SIM cards and the top-ups. It’s imperative for us to have a local line at all times for emergencies and to get our Uber! Misc. expenses is our catch all bucket but a recurring entry would be laundry expenses wherever we don’t have a washing machine at our disposal.
So there you have it. SGD26,452 well spent! Do any of these numbers make you giggle in glee? Fall off your chair? Let us know!
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That’s my dream vacation too. Are the numbers cost per person ? How many people were sharing accommodations bec costs are lower with more people sharing?
Hey Fong, thanks for coming by. Do let us know when you embark on your dream trip, would love to hear about it! The numbers are in totality for our family of 4. We always get a room for all of us or an apartment for all of us. Costs are usually higher because we look for a place that accommodate all of us together and with Booking.com and AirBnB, the costs go up with the # of people staying even for the same place. Still cheaper than getting 2 separate rooms or apartments 😉