Budgeting

How much is enough money?

How long is a piece of string? What YOU think is enough, isn't enough for a decent meal for someone else. Or as Jean Ferris (USA) said at a seminar I gave, after telling the group that a pair of young Europeans toured the US on US$10 per day, "Ten dollars! That's a tip!"

To plan your budget, here's some rough guidelines:

"First-tier" countries such as northern Europe, US$60-80 a day and up per person.

"Second-tier" countries such as the rest of Europe, Canada and the USA, US$40-60 a day per person.

"Third-tier" countries, such as Latin America, US$30 a day is considered enough for the average budget traveller, not counting major items like shipping the bike - or yourself, and repairs and servicing.

"Fourth-tier" countries, parts of Africa and Asia, can be done for less, many for less than US$20 day, especially in Asia.

The surprise is that Africa can be expensive - if you want to do what most people go to Africa for - to see the animals - you have to go on a safari - and that can be VERY expensive!

Another surprise expense comes when you hit Ushuaia - and discover that that is where the Antarctica cruise ships are based. You can get an amazing deal on a cruise to Antarctica - and you REALLY should do it - for only around US$2500 for a seven to ten day cruise. That's less than half what it would normally be!

So always be prepared for surprises, and don't NOT do something exciting or once in a lifetime, just because it's expensive - you will always regret it later. Getting back there later to do it is even harder than it seems. There's too many other places to go!

Shipping the bike varies all over the map - but for a very rough guide, think around US$1000 for continent to continent shipping, sometimes more, sometimes less.

Here's some budgets - (more to come if you send us yours!)

A discussion on budgeting for a RTW on the HUBB

Another thread on "How does one afford this lifestyle?"

And a search on "budget" from the entire site.

An Africa spreadsheet - everything from Ken Keller's Africa trip: "Myself and my friend (Dominator and NTV650 respectively) travelled from Lagos, Nigeria to Dublin, Ireland in 2000, without any major problems. We travelled through Benin, Togo, Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, Mali, Senegal, Mauritania, Western Sahara, Morocco, Spain and France.

The spreadsheet (has) all the information regarding route, equipment, costs, etc. It won't 'fit' everyone's trip, but it might give people an idea of how to go about storing all their information in one place."

Download it in Zip format - 100kb. Unzips to an xls.