sandals, sleeping bag, laundry?

[LHR02]

Agree.....laundry is a necessity! After a while you just have to get those clothes washed. ;D A quick look through my expenses journal showed the following:

Bath, England - 5.40 pounds (drop off/pick up place)
Brugge, Belgium - 4.00 euro
s'Hertogenbosh, Neth - 4.70 euro
Venice - 5.30 euro
Florence - 15.50 euro! (strange place, you could sit there in what looked to be a 'self serve, but the attendant had to put the clothes in and out and fold for you and run the machines....no place for you to put your money in)
Bayeaux, France - 12.00 euros strictly self serve

In Florence and Bayeaux, I no doubt could have found a cheaper place, but in both of those the laundry was virtually right across the street from where I was staying, and that counts for a lot sometimes. ;D

ging

[WillTravel]

An expenses journal sounds like a great idea. Maybe you could describe what method you used, etc.? I assume it's nothing fancy, but just curious.

I definitely agree that sometimes convenience is worth paying for.

[LHR02]

sure....I just had a little pocket notebook, sort of like one of the slim dayplanners (but not that fancy!). And like my photo notebook I always had it on me. Whever I spent any money I'd jot it down, or sometimes not and would just write it all in when I did my 'journal' in the evenings. As long as I maintained it every eveing I had no trouble remember what I had spent that day. I added in just about everything, entry costs, bus tickets, cards and stamps, grocery visits, newspapers, internet access...you name it just about. If I bought it, I know where and how much it cost me. ;D

an example day from Amsterdam:
21.00 room
4.50 Anne Frank Museum
5.00 Judenmuseum
2.75 lunch
4.50 Resistance museum
12.50 dinner and tip
1.20 newspaper
2.50 beer
(just this basic throughout....eg it might say 'grocery' but didn't get specific about what I bought there)

Since I was keeping, most faithfully, my photo journal this was just a tiny bit more and it did help me control my spending somewhat. Easily allowed me to know towards the end of the week if I needed to seriously budget for a day or two. ;D Plus, I didn't want all this money stuff cluttering up my journal.

ging

[nitsansh]

I also did that... every expense recorded, and at the end of each day I summed it up to 5 categories: accomodation, food, sights, transportation, miscelenous... and converted from local currency to Euro...
Also recorded every money change...

Here's an example...

May 9 - Croatia (prices in Kuna):
Hotel Monte Mulini (Rovinj) - 3 nights HB - 130.50 per night + laundry 18 = 409.50 (paid by Visa card)
Bus Rovinj to Koper - 67 + 3 (reservation) = 70
Film Kodak 200 (36 prints) - 38
Croison - 3.20
Total for that day (in Croatia): 520.70 = 69 EUR
Money left: 217.38

May 9 continued - Slovenia (prices in Tolar):
Money exchange (post office at Koper): 50USD (cheque) = 9775 Tolar (2% commision)
Bus Koper to Ljubljana - 2360 + 240 (baggage) = 2600
Phonecard - 700
Zetons (bus tokens) - 170X2=340
Doughnut - 170
Money exchange (Bank in Ljubljana): 70 USD TC = 13959 SIT
BIT Center (hostel) - bed (2800) + breakfast (800) = 3600 (Visa)
Zetons - 170X2=340
Dinner - Tortellini Romano 1200 + Lemonade 300 = 1500
Total (in Slovenia): 9250 = 40 EUR
Money left: 18084

Expenses: (in Slovenia)
Accomodation - 2800 (12 EUR)
Food - 2470 (11 EUR)
Transportation - 3280 (14 EUR)
Miscelenous - 700 (3 EUR)
Sights - none
Total - 9250 (40 EUR)

Off course... this isn't a typical day... not only it's divided between 2 countries with different currencies, but I paid for 4 nights accomodation... usually food expenses were higher than this... If not for this record I wouldn't believe I ate only one croison and one doughnut between breakfast and dinner...

Since I wrote expenses on the day I paid for them, which sometimes wasn't the day I used them, the variations in daily expenses were very wide... the record shows that I spent 109 EUR in one day, but if you deduct the hotel bill for 3 previous nights (55 EUR) that's reasonable... and if you take out inter-city transportation as well (21 EUR) there's only 33 EUR worth of daily expenses... that's quite cheap, even for eastern Europe...

While expenses for accomodation and food are fairly stable, if you keep the same level, the other 3 categories may vary widely from day to day... in this day I didn't pay for sight seeing, but I bought a film and a phonecard (both count as miscelenous)... so to get a meaningful data of your expenses you should sum up a week... if you see that you spent more than the budget you planned you can check your record and look for expenses you could leave without...
As in every business... accurate accounting is essential to monitor your financial status...

[LHR02]

More power to you Nitsansh.....THAT seems way too much like 'work' to me. All that categorizing and converting is loads more detail than I will ever need. I just wanted a simple, brief record of my expenses. To each their own journals I suppose. ;D

[nitsansh]

I agree it was not necessary... but after I started it was habitual... I guess that took about 15 minutes each day...

You should be aware that I crossed borders 4 times in 18 days, and each country has different currency... this could be confusing... to add to that, I had money in both USD and EUR, some in cash and some in TC, and also a credit card which I used some times to withdraw money or pay... and all this had to be eventually converted to my own currency (Israeli Shekel)...
On such short trip, and in relatively cheap countries, I didn't have to keep a strict budget... but when you travel for months, an extra 5$ a day would make a hundreds of $$$ overall... if you travel for 100 days for example, and spend 50$ a day, saving 5$ a day could add 10 days to your trip...

[me]

4 GBP per load? ouch!! i guess you gotta pay what you gotta pay.

on my last trip, i did laundry in Lisbon a bit before flying to London, my last stop before home. as i was there for just a few days, laundry wasn't an issue.

- d