Travel

While admission to the Taj was pricey, everything else in India was crazy cheap. I spent less for seven weeks in India than I did for one week in Italy. And guys its the Taj! It ranks up there as one of the cooler travel experiences out there.

Many people have asked me, “How can you afford to travel around the world?!”

I have answered incarnations of this question dozens of times and what people are really saying is: Traveling the world is super expensive, how could you have possibly afforded it.

Well, as any regular A Little Adrift readers have surmised, I do not live off of a trust fund  . In fact, my family is quite poor and I made it through college solely on merit-based scholarships. So, instead of counting on help from family, I budgeted for the trip. I sold my couch, my clothes, my cups. I sold my car too, and I saved ruthlessly in the countdown months. I took on side-work to sock away money, and then, I worked on freelance SEO from the road  for the entire year. And through all that, I came to the same conclusions as those backpackers who have adventurously gone before me: RTW travel is cheaper than you think! 

I am not saying its dirt cheap, but compared to my life in LA with $1200+ going to rent and bills each month, I could use that same online income to travel through developing regions of the world, only digging into my savings for the long-haul flights.

I meticulously documented every single expense from my initial year-long RTW trip. My almost OCD obsession with accurately tracking my expenses is epic but in the five years since I originally posted this breakdown, other backpackers have loved the precise and exact breakdown of just how much I spent throughout a year of active world travel. And five years later, even with rising global food costs, they are still traveling strong on similar budgets.

The total cost of my RTW trip: $17,985

Youre shocked right now, I know, I sprang it on you out of nowhere! Close the gaping jaw.

Thats it?!

This is how excited I was at the tail-end of my round the world trip when I was in England and I realized I had pulled it off. I had just one month left on the road at that point.

I tracked my RTW budget in this mini-calendar!

That figure. A mere $17,985 is fully and completely inclusive of everything from getting jabbed in the arm for my Yellow Fever vaccine to buying all of my pre-travel gear. my travel insurance.  all of my plane flights, bus rides. camel safaris. surfing lessons , zip-lining adventures in the Laos jungle, and straight through to my first delicious sub back on home soil when I passed through Philly on my final layover of the trip.

What does that number not include? Personal choices that upped the price bit: an external hard drive for photo storage, new camera (old one was waterlogged in Australia), and I rented a car alone in Ireland (most backpacker budgets wouldn’t allow for this so I included my car’s petrol to approximate the cost of public transportation for three weeks). My personal total, inclusive of all of that, was just under $19,000 so its still a bargain considering I was on the road for nearly an entire year. And again, I stress, this is thousands less than my annual expenses living in Los Angeles, California.

How Did I Keep my RTW Budget in Check?

Four deceptively simple travel tips:

• Consider staying in a hostel to keep your budget in check.  Theyre a great place to meet new people (and private rooms mean they work for couples and families too). I love the self catering facilities offered at most, and pretty much always dig a free breakfast. I used hostels throughout Europe and Australia and found the guesthouses in Asia were incredibly  budget-friendly (both then and since I tend to love the privacy of guesthouses and the local planning help you can get from the guesthouse owners!)
• Keep a budget spreadsheet for all of your expenses! Seriously, while I think you should splurge and enjoy throughout your RTW, if you are truly budgeting then know where your money goes. Download the RTW budget spreadsheet I designed for other travelers; its formatted, blank, and editable.
• Limit time in the Western world. Developed, Western countries cost significantly more for travelers, so structure your time so you dont wipe out your savings by staying too long in Europe, Australia, or the US.
• Travel slowly and overland. Avoid purchasing too many plane tickets and take local transportation better stories and a better insight into local cultures is the upside!
• Buy some travel insurance. Its sad to see travelers go home in a hurry, months before scheduled because they got sick and needed medical care, or they got robbed and had no recourse. Though many regions have affordable healthcare, its surprisingly cheap to just buy a long-term policy from World Nomads and cover yourself if things go south.

Now, the following tables and charts will further outline my RTW budget including some of the country-by-country expenses. And because I just had to go that extra mile, my complete-down-to-the penny budget is available for viewing; the budget spreadsheet includes every single expense itemized out in an absolutely gorgeous Google spreadsheet if I can toot my own horn for a moment!

Also, dont forget to check out the well-loved RTW FAQ and Travel Planning Guide as well as our blank, formatted spreadsheet as a downloadable excel file to log your own RTW travel budget  (you can also access it as a Google Doc and save to your own Drive)!

RTW Travel Budget Breakdown

Total Costs for Each Category of Expenses

**Lodging. All accommodation with some couchsurfing and a few contacts along the way.

**Food. Snacks, meals, and my chocolate obsession.

**Entertainment. Going out on the town this will be higher if you drink often.

**Activities. Includes my volunteer program and all tour, trips, and group adventures.

**Transportation. Excluding flights and all intra-country transportation.

**Interent. I work from the road and paid a lot for internet at times lower if youre not taking a laptop!

Average Daily Costs per Country for my RTW Budget

Total Costs of Each Country and Number of Travel Days

**These totals do not include flights, travel gear, and other misc pre-trip expenditures, only my actual on-the-road costs.

Resources Mentioned in the Post:

Other RTW Budgets  and Resources You Should Check Out

• How to Travel the World on $50 a Day. My friend Matt wrote this book, now in its second edition, which has a breakdown by country on what you can expect. I own a copy of it and its great to see all the data and tips in one spot.
• Solo Male Traveler 2015 Budget : Jimmy detailed his two years on the road with every expense logged and tracked. He shows its possible and he came in at about 20K per year.
• Couple Mid-Range Budget. Akila and Patrick traveled together staying at hotels and mid-range options the whole way, with a bit more food and luxury than super-budget travel and share their breakdown.