So one of the main reasons I started this Travel Blog is to help others to travel the world for cheap!! I have heard time after time that I need to write these tips down for everyone else!!! So, I thought I’d start with the 2012 16-day Amazing Girls trip that my mom, sisters, friends and I took to Ireland, Scotland, and PARIS!!! I know, you are thinking “How did you afford this?” Well, let me explain!!!
At the time we went in 2012, the dollar wasn’t the strongest, so our trip this year is actually costing us less!! Our hotel prices are actually going down!!
The key to cheap travel, if you aren’t into hostels and backpacking, is to travel in a group!!! The shares the costs 4-6 ways.
When we are traveling in a group of girls like this, I always look for Hotels and B&Bs with triple rooms. European travel is great for this!!! This is just not something we see in the U.S. very often. So most of the time, we can rent 2 triple rooms instead of 3 double/twin rooms for much cheaper. Many of the castle hotels we stay in also have triple rooms or what they call family rooms. If you look at Murphy’s Bar Killarney, you pay the same price for a triple room (twin and a full bed) as you do for a room with just a full bed. Though, some B&Bs will charge you per person. This is also GREAT for families!!!
I love to use Booking.com when I am planning our trip because of the FREE cancellation and you don’t have to pay anything upfront!!!
When my sisters and I are planning out our trips we often change our route a few times in the beginning because we want to see it all!!!
If you are planning to base yourself in one area for the entire time, then look into a vacation home from www.VRBO.com or www.homeaway.com for even cheaper prices!!! And… you only have to unpack once!! Check out this Historic 5-bedroom home in Galway for only $20/night!!! Or this Actually 7-bedroom, 13th Century Castle outside of Galway for $370/night. Still less per person than a hotel most of the time. Just don’t forget there’s usually a deposit and a cleaning fee.
Paris was definetly our most expensive night for the space that we got. We may have paid more at Dalhousie Castle in Scotland, but we shared 2 to a room with 4-poster beds and enormous bathrooms. When we stayed at Barcaldine Castle we had the entire castle to ourselves!!!
We stayed at the Hotel Bac Saint-Germain in the Saint Germain area in the 7th Arrondissment. It was just about half-way between the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame. The perfect location for our quick trip to Paris. Talk about tiny compared to US standards!!! The elevator only held two people with no luggage, side by side. Getting our luggage up to the upper floors was fun. Our rooms were tiny with even tinier bathrooms. Plus, one of our rooms had an extra cot in it to save money, which made it even more cramped.
Barcaldine Castle Scotland
Hotel Bac St. Germain
So, here is what we paid for our last trip in 2012.
My friend Courtney only came for the first 6 nights in Ireland and one night in Dalhousie Castle in Edinburgh, Scotland. Her total cost was only $1385. That’s amazing!! Try and book a self-drive tour for that price and still stay in 2 castles!! Her flights were a bit more than ours because she booked them a later than we booked ours.
We also spent a little money on entertainment and bought the Historic Scotland Pass and the Ireland Heritage Card to save us money on all of the castles and historical sites we visited. These passes didn’t cover all of the sites, but most of them and for a discounted price.
So let’s talk about cars. I usually book my cars at Expedia because they have free cancellation in case we find a better deal. If there are only 2 of you sharing a midsize, automatic car you are looking to spend about $350, only $155 if you are comfortable driving a manual! But, if there are only 2 of you, that’s about $175 a person. If you travel in a group of 4, that’s only $87/person. If there are 6 of you like we had in Scotland, then a minivan is a better idea. Which is about $90/person (plus one extra driver is about $10 a day if you need it).
We ended up renting 2 small car in Ireland last time we went because it was half the price of renting a minivan then. It looks like the prices aren’t as bad now.
Don’t forget that Ireland is splint into Ireland and Northern Ireland. Most of the car rental companies will charge you for driving into the UK Northern Ireland and vice-versa. After much searching and emailing the companies in most cases, I discovered that Alamo charges 30€ to drive it to Northern Ireland, Hertz does not charge a fee to enter Northern Ireland, but Enterprise charges a whopping $150!!! So please calculate this into the rental costs if you are planning a trip north to Giant’s Causeway.
Petrol (gas) prices in Ireland and the UK are ridiculous, so that has to be taken into consideration.
Let’s talk about flights. Currently, I prefer to look up all available flights on Google Flights and then once I find the flights I like, I book straight from the company and not thru Kayak or Expedia if possible. I try to book with United or Aer Lingus if I’m flying to Europe. Our round trip flight to Dublin in June is only $680!!! I used an app called the Hopper to watch the prices and then booked one Saturday night when it alarmed me that the prices had dropped $300!!!
For the short, “puddle-jumper” flights between countries take a look at RyanAir, EasyJet, and Aer Lingus. Some of the flights are crazy cheap!! You would be amazed at how cheap it is to fly from one country to another over in Europe! We are looking at an early morning flight on Aer Lingus from Dublin to London is that gets us to Heathrow at 9:05am. There are dozens of direct flights to London that range from $17-$67 plus the price of luggage. That’s right, $17!!!! For those of you can live out of a backpack for weeks at a time, this is a steal!!!!
RyanAir, Aer Lingus, and British Airways all run direct flights to London from Dublin, some of them directly to the London City Airport in the middle of the city. You can even fly from Shannon Airport in Ireland to Alicante, Spain for $30 if you book early enough certain times of the year!!!
Baggage rates on these short-hall flights ranges from $25-$40 per bag and most of them require your carry-on bag to be less than 19″ with a small personal item. So, those additional costs will start to add up.
Let’s talk about food and drinks in Ireland. On average we paid less than $10 for a meal the last time we were in Ireland. Most of the time the portions were so large that we could even share an order of fish and chips and maybe split a salad or something. The food scene in Ireland is really taking off. So, you don’t have to have fish and chips at every meal! A pint of Guinness or Bulmers will run you about $5-7 depending on what part of the country you are in, more in Dublin as compared to Dingle.
Now, in Paris you will pay $20 for a small salad!!! It is ridiculously expensive to eat there. You have to pay for water and even to sit outside you pay higher prices.
Now, as you can see my sisters and I do not fly first-class, nor do we stay in 5-star hotels. But, we have a great time and enjoy ourselves. I read lots of reviews on hotels and try to alternate between B&Bs, Castles, and downtown city hotels for some nightlife. If you only stay in B&Bs and find a great price on a flight you could easily go to Ireland for a week for less than $1000/person + food, drinks, and souvenirs. That’s less than a latte a day for 7 months of the year. So, plan and start saving because you are going on vacation!!!!
