[0:00] I just returned from my European
backpacking trip and in this video I'm
[0:03] going to break down exactly how much
money I spent I'll also provide
[0:07] budgeting tips on how you can save money
on your trip I broke my expenses up into
[0:12] five categories being travel food
accommodation experiences and other it's
[0:17] no secret that travel is going to be one
of your largest expenses among these
[0:22] flights will likely be your biggest cost
I went on six flights and spent $600 or
[0:28] 560
I purchased my three major flights all
[0:32] together and flew TAP Air Portugal
getting me from Chicago to Lisbon Lisbon
[0:37] to Rome and Paris back to Chicago in
total this cost me
[0:43] $468 this airfare was so cheap because a
I booked these flights 9 months in
[0:47] advance and B I went on the shoulder
season I flew into Lisbon in late
[0:53] February and I flew out of Paris in
early may I also spent $87 for a
[0:58] roundtrip flight from Rome to Athens and
$50 for a flight from Bari Italy to
[1:04] Dubrovnik Croatia my next major travel
expense was the EUR Rail Pass I paid
[1:11] $369 for the 10day in 2-month pass which
gave me 10 travel days on any train I
[1:18] also paid an additional
$43 on train reservations for my pass
[1:24] altogether this cost me
$411 189 I'd recommend checking the
[1:29] indiv individual train fairs for each of
your desired destinations before
[1:33] committing to a pass personally opting
for this pass saved me a couple hundred
[1:37] bucks plus it's incredibly convenient
and it offers you a lot of flexibility
[1:41] you can cancel a travel day with ease
right up until midnight I also spent 350
[1:47] bucks on other major travel this
included some train rides that I booked
[1:51] separately for my pass day trip travel
and fairies from Athens to the Greek
[1:56] Islands finally I spent $240 on public
Transit meaning Subways buses and trams
[2:03] I tried to do as much walking as
possible but sometimes I just had to use
[2:07] the public transit you're not going to
walk an hour with a 25lb bag on your
[2:11] back altogether travel cost me $1,600 or
[2:17] $1,490 which divided over the course of
my 70-day trip cost me $23 a day or €1
[2:23] and 26 if you're willing to spend a
significant amount of time strategizing
[2:28] your travel you can travel a affordably
and explore numerous destinations the
[2:32] next expense category is food first I
spent
[2:37] $670 on groceries this included food
that I would prepare for dinner and food
[2:42] for lunches a lot of the times I would
go into supermarkets and grab some meat
[2:46] and cheese for lunch I cooked about 25%
of my dinners for me it just wasn't
[2:52] sustainable to cook every single night
there were many days where I came back
[2:56] to the hospital exhausted from a day of
sightseeing so I would just eat out but
[3:01] eating out is considerably more
expensive in total I spent
[3:05] $1,700 on eating out which includes
sitdown restaurants fast casual
[3:10] restaurants and street food I believe
that part of the travel experience is
[3:14] eating the Local Foods and that you
should try the cuisine in each new place
[3:18] that you visit in total food cost me
$2,440 or
[3:25] $2,260 which breaks down into $35 or €32
a day so yeah I spent a lot of money on
[3:32] food but I also eat a lot more food than
the average Backpacker I'm 6ot and I
[3:37] weigh 185 lbs and I worked out almost
every day and I averaged about 20,000
[3:43] steps per day there are many days where
I burned 4,000 plus calories so yeah I
[3:49] think you could get away with spending a
bit less on food but honestly a lot of
[3:54] the time street food costs about the
same as cooking your own food usually
[3:58] about €10 a meal I don't think it's
sustainable to cook more than 25% of
[4:03] your meals if you're doing as much
walking or sightseeing as I did but
[4:08] obviously if you cook more of your own
meals or eat a bit more street food you
[4:13] could save a bit of money in this
category the next category is
[4:17] accommodation about 80% of the time I
stayed in hostile dorm rooms and the
[4:22] other 20% of the time was airbnbs
staying in hostile dorm rooms will
[4:27] definitely be an adjustment at first but
you'll get used to it pretty fast I also
[4:33] only stayed in airbnbs when I had
someone else to split the cost with and
[4:37] when that split cost was cheaper than
staying in a hostel overall I spent
[4:42] $1,700 on accommodation which comes out
to
[4:46] $24.45 or €
2264 a night I also broke down the
[4:53] average cost of accommodation by country
you should note though that for Slovenia
[4:57] Hungary Austria and C
I only stayed in one city so the prices
[5:02] may not be a great representation of how
much that country costs so yeah
[5:08] accommodation in Europe is not crazy
expensive by any means especially if you
[5:13] can go in the offseason or the shoulder
season like I did my recommendation
[5:17] would be to book out hosts in advance
for cities that have limited options you
[5:22] may also want to book hostiles in
advance for busy cities in Peak tourist
[5:26] times but for busy cities with more
options you could wait until just a few
[5:31] days prior also if you book through
hostile world you could pay a bit extra
[5:36] for free cancellation which will allow
you to cancel your room 3 days prior if
[5:41] you find something cheaper or if the
price drops elsewhere I also think that
[5:45] staying in hostiles while solo traveling
is imperative because a you can't split
[5:50] the cost of an Airbnb with someone else
and B you'll meet so many cool
[5:55] like-minded people my next cost category
is experiences I spent $300 on
[6:01] excursions and activities for instance
the entry fee for going into a castle or
[6:07] a church I did a wine tour at the
beginning of my trip when I was in
[6:10] Portugal but outside of that didn't do
any tours I'm just not a really big tour
[6:16] guy so that was an easy thing not to
spend money on I also spent $46 on
[6:22] souvenirs like bracelets and rings and
shirts which puts us at
[6:28] $345 or
€320 which breaks down into
[6:33] $493 or €
4457 per day for experiences finally we
[6:41] have the other category the first thing
I put in this category was my travel
[6:46] insurance I got my travel insurance
through World Nomads and it covered me
[6:51] for health insurance trip cancellation
and lost luggage or damaged items it
[6:57] cost me
$262 for my 70 days and 11 countries
[7:02] fortunately I didn't need to use my
insurance but I do think it's crucial to
[7:07] have because if you were to get
seriously injured that would leave you
[7:11] in a really tough spot in a foreign
country my next expense was my phone
[7:16] bill I switched over to T-Mobile for
this trip because I couldn't find any
[7:20] American Carrier plan that was nearly as
cheap for my 70-day trip a lot of the
[7:25] carriers charge $10 per day extra which
would have ran my pockets T-Mobile's
[7:31] international plan costs just 50 bucks
per 30 days so I just went with three of
[7:37] those I was allotted 15 gigs of
high-speed data per 30 days and I
[7:41] typically use between 6 and 7 gigs I
don't really use social media on my
[7:47] phone that much so that was really just
for maps and to Google stuff I opted not
[7:53] to get local SIM cards because you need
to get a new SIM card in each country
[7:57] that you visit and I was legit in
Slovakia for just a day trip so it would
[8:02] have just been a nuisance in total the
foam Plan cost me
[8:07] $162 with tax the next other category
was alcohol in total I spent
[8:14] $167 on drinking I'm not a huge drinker
but there are certain places where
[8:19] clubbing is almost part of the
experience such as Budapest or Berlin in
[8:25] general for me I was just too tired to
drink at the end of the night after a
[8:31] long day of sightseeing but I met plenty
of people that went out or went clubbing
[8:36] literally every single day so you're
probably going to fall somewhere on that
[8:40] spectrum of not drinking at all to
drinking a lot but just note it will get
[8:46] expensive if you're drinking and going
out every night finally I spent $44 on
[8:51] laundry I did my laundry n times over
the course of my 10we trip four times at
[8:57] airbnbs which was free and and five
times at laundromats so on average it
[9:02] cost me about 8 to do my laundry
altogether the other category added
[9:08] another
$637 or
[9:12] $590 all right now for the moment that
you've all been waiting for in total I
[9:17] spent drum roll
[9:21] please $
6,741 or €
[9:27] 6,244 which comes out to
$96.3 or
[9:33] 8920 per day if you eat as much as I do
or want to see as much as I saw I think
[9:40] this is as cheap as you can do it but
obviously if you cook your own food more
[9:44] or cut other costs like alcohol or
excursions you could save a bit more
[9:49] lastly I wanted to talk about how I
managed to save up the necessary funds
[9:53] for this adventure when I got my first
job at 15 I started setting aside money
[9:58] specifically for this trip and over the
years I worked every summer I worked ta
[10:04] jobs and other jobs while I was at
school and last summer I landed a solid
[10:09] corporate internship although I
initially budgeted 15,000 for my entire
[10:13] trip I soon realized that I could spend
much less with some Thrifty choices so
[10:20] with that extra money I'm planning on
going to Costa Rica at the end of June
[10:24] for a month and I'm going to make a
bunch of Vlogs from that and I've been
[10:28] doing vlogs vogs of my entire trip thus
far so subscribe to my channel for that
[10:34] [Music]