Food and Expenses

Please note that all previous prices may not include food, because depending on what you want, food can be many different things. Eat the bare essentials and you could be living on €2 to €3 a day but if you want to eat out, it would be much higher. Say for the aforementioned Mont Saint-Michel, it would be anywhere from €9,40 at a pancake bar to a more 5 star price that I won't even mention or ever afford.

Expected savings: $6,000 - $7,000
Expected cost in the end $5,000
Read on if you want to know why...

My first trip to Europe was very bare, I probably spent much less than the allotted €2-3 but you should always account for much more than what you expect. For instance, when I was in Spain I payed €5 on over 8 pounds of fruits and veggies, to be exact I bought equal amounts of bananas, strawberries and cherries. This lasted me only 3 days worth of meals but was one of the more cheap ways to live. On the other hand, you can buy crackers and cheese for cheap. Now Alcohol also adds much to the bill. If you want wine and cheese, well you will expect a much greater cost. So for all intensive purposes, because I intend to eat out a bit more this next time, I expect to pay about €5 a day but will set asside €10 maybe even more if I have the money. Also mid trip you might find yourself over spending on food and cut back. I also intend to say to myself and others "I have saved up €5.000" but truely have €6.000 or €7.000 in the bank. So total expectations for a 3 month excursion won't be above €500 but I will probably have €1.000 set aside for food. What will really happen is that I will probably spend €300-400. I will also lose weight and get in shape in the process(walking). If I spend all €1.000, it isn't that big of a deal because I oversave for every part of a trip. To give you a judgement of the cost of things. The first trip I took was in Venice, we go there thursday I think, stayed the whole weekend and was back for classes on Monday. It cost I think like €110 (maybe it was 80 cannot remember), most expensive trip, we ate out 2 times a day and everything! We took a gandalier, even went to a classical music concert!!! That is around €27 a day, that is a lot. It was definitely 4 days in venice, 3 nights. So that was a great time but cost a lot. On my 10 day trip, we went to Athens (Greece), Pompei, Piza, and Firenze! We took two cruise ships, which we will not make the mistake of taking Super Fast Ferries again(cost €16 extra), and that trip cost me only €85, which means for 90 days of such traveling it would be under €1.000! We planned ahead, we hit the Acropolis in Athens on the day it was free, we even ate out in Greece! In fact, I cannot imagine making that trip any more expensive except for food. The €85 included food and hostels and travel fair. Some things cost more than others, like the first ferry was free, but the second was €16. Pompei was worth it at €11 for the whole day. Overall we should have gone to Piza and paid for it (i.e. during the day). Maybe a few more museums but that is it. So all in all, it will probably be like $800 for the plane, €920 ($1,300) for the Eurail pass and maybe $1,900 for the actual trip. making it all $4,000 if we went the way I did the first time. I plan on having like 6 or 7 thousand saved to have a better time.