The Cost of Traveling the World for 1 Year

Photo by Josh Meister Photo.

Our goal on our (almost) year of travel was to average out with a spend of $1,000 per week ($52,000 for the year), or $142.86 per day, all-inclusive – flights, accommodations, activities, food, everything. With the help of Trail Wallet, we were fairly meticulous in tracking our spending, give our take a few dollars here and there. We blew our budget by a lot during the first portion of the trip in Europe, we thought we’d easily make up for it in the second part, Asia, but didn’t, and then we tightened our belts and did a lot better in the last few months in Latin America. We wound up cutting our trip six weeks short, so our total travel time was 46 weeks instead of 52.

CASH

In those 46 weeks, we spent (drumroll please) $48,902.44, or $1,063.10 per week (or $151.87 per day). Not bad! We did go over budget, but not by a whole lot. And, in theory, we stayed well within our overall trip budget of $52,000 since we ended early.

But, if we add in our pre-trip expenses, including vaccinations, trip insurance, and a couple of other costs, we’re looking at adding another $6,631.23, bringing us to a grand total output of $55,533.67. Which puts us squarely over budget. So I guess it’s a bit subjective on if we made it under budget or not!

Here’s how that spend breaks down:

• Europe: $20,058.23 over 111 days, which comes out to $1,264.71 per week or $180.70 per day
• Asia: $19,893.93 over 133 days, which comes out to $1,047.05 per week or $142.30 per day
• Latin America: $8,795.68 over 81 days, which comes out to $760.21 per week or $108 per day

Our most expensive country by far was Iceland, where we averaged out to a whopping $436.68 average daily spend, with Australia and Bora Bora coming in second at $255.14 per day, and Greece in third place at $218.38 a day. The least expensive was Mexico where we averaged a daily spend of $99 per day, next was Indonesia at $104.22 a day, and following that was Colombia at $106.15 per day.

Please keep in mind though that it’s not quite that straightforward. In some countries we were able to use a ton of points and miles, in others friends hosted us for a week or so for free, and in some places, we ballered out (Bora Bora, I’m looking at you). The time of year we visited each spot was a factor too. We unknowingly traveled to Greece during one of the highest points of the high season when prices were at their peak and accommodation options were limited. Another thing that hugely impacted our spend was if friends or family came to meet us. We unequivocally spent more money during those times than when we were on our own.

POINTS

Points and miles are a big contributing factor in even having the gall to dream of doing a trip like this, and they absolutely made a huge impact in our total spent. We used 599,544 airline miles, 778,614 hotel points + 1 IHG annual free night certificate, and 1,022,600 flex points (Chase Ultimate Rewards, Citi Thank You Points, Amex Membership Rewards, etc.)

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If you want to combine those (even though their values vary greatly!), in total, we utilized 2,400,758 points. The approximate equivalent cash amount is $29,175. Holy cow, that’s more than half our trip budget!

But, in truth, this amount isn’t entirely accurate. It’s factual in that had we paid cash for what we used these points for, we would have spent an extra almost $30,000. BUT some of the ways in which we redeemed these points were for hotels or flights that we never would have in our right minds actually paid cash for. For example, if we weren’t able to use points to fly Business Class from LAX to Colombia (with a cash equivalent value of about $1,000), we would have booked our asses in Coach. And if we hadn’t cashed in a ton of points for 5 nights in an overwater bungalow in Bora Bora (with a cash equivalent of about $5,500), I’d still be pining away for that “someday” experience because there’s no way we could have justified spending that kind of money on this trip. On the other hand, there were tons of instances where points helped us out on necessary expenditures like reasonably-priced hotel rooms and flights. So the amount of money saved by using points is somewhat subjective and somewhat to be taken with more than a grain of salt, but probably not more than a pinch.

STATS

And just for fun (and because we kept track of all of this!), here’s how our trip broke down by the numbers:

In its entirety, our trip was 325 days long, we visited 19 countries and five continents, we traveled 85,302 km or 53,004 miles (which is more than twice the circumference of Earth), we took 32 plane rides and 11 ferry rides, we slept in 78 different beds, we made countless new friends, and we spent $48,902.44 (or $55,533.67 depending on your feelings about pre-trip expenses) and used 2,400,758 points + miles.

Not a bad way to spend a year!

All images TM & © 2017 Josh Meister Photo and Shari Margolin (unless otherwise stated). Please don’t steal or “borrow” – just be cool, be cool.