Travel is high on our list of experiences that we are willing to spend money on. This does not mean that we splurge the YOLO way. This first “big” travel with our kids now can serve as a benchmark for future travels. What was the cost of all of this?
As our holiday destination, we picked Croatia. We also decided to use for the first time AirBnB and opted for 2 apartments, each rented for one week. This would allow us to have a “home” base to start our trips and at the same time we would avoid living out of a suitcase.
In our pre-kids travel, we did not mind to backpack and stay only 2/3 nights per location. With kids, some more stability seemed needed. That is our opinion. I am curious what your take is.
The costs
| Item | Cost | Comment |
|---|---|---|
| Air travel | 749,62€ | No air mile hacking in Belgium |
| excess bagage fine | 40,00€ | Tip to self: read documents better |
| Airport parking | 94,50€ | Supposed to be the cheapest one |
| Airport lunch | 27,05€ | Next time: brown bag |
| Rental Car | 830,30€ | Fun fact: more expensive than the flight |
| Fuel | 55,14€ | One gas tank |
| Zadar apartment | 690,00€ | Great view from terrace on the old town |
| Srima appartment | 715€ | Great nature sounds |
| Fun and eating in Croatia | 1181,17€ | Kraka, Nin, Pag, aquaparc,… |
| meal going back home | 42,42€ | Did not want to cook the first night home |
| Total | 4425,02€ | That is 73,75 per person per day |
With this money, we had loads of fun. We did spent a lot of quality time as a family, we escaped the notorious bad August month in Belgium, we created a lot of memories.
Swimming at the Sea Organ is great. When a bigger wave hits the organ, the loud sounds makes everybody sheer!
Pag and Nin are 2 small towns that I can recommend to all. The combo beach/mountain view is top. We also went to the queen’s beach.
We took a taxi boat to a nearby island to visit a quite beach. A great relaxing day.
Krka national parc is top! Just make sure you are there when the parc opens so you get to see the waterfall in clear. Once the buses from the tours arrive, it gets crowded.
A water amusement park puts a smile on the face of our kids. And dare I saying it: waterslides even charm me.
Analyzing the cost
The fun side is well covered. We learned a lot as family: you have an idea of what a perfect FIRE life looks like, you test it and improve. I look forward to the next year!
On the cost side, I am quite happy to see at what cost we did the holiday. Could we do better/ cheaper? yes, we can!
Important to note is that we will not do cheap for the sake of cheap. We have our definition of what a fun holiday means: Eat out a few times, a few cocktails/beer at a beach bar, self organised excursions (where possible) to explore parcs/towns, relax atthe beach/apartment, no long walks from the house to the beach or centre,… And Mr ATL does not like to drive.
Saving on air travel/rental: Driving 1525 km (950 miles) is not an activity that makes me happy. I see that as a 2 day drive: not a start-at10pm-drive-till-next-day-7pm. Maybe even a 3 day drive. Right now, as long as the budget allows, this is the kind of distance we are will to bear the cost of air travel/rental. I less affluent times, we will drive and save easily 1000€.
Excess luggage: no comment. Luckily, it is a small amount
Spending in Croatia: We had – in our opinion – the ideal mix of eating out, brownbags and cooking at the apartment. We could save another150€ or so doing less eating out. That would be plan C for me.
When we would apply the 1150€ cost saving and take into account that 2 weeks at home would cost us 700€, we could do this kind of holiday for approx 2600€. That is a very reasonable amount in my eyes. To be seen if I then would take a dream holiday every 2 year or do a plan B holiday every year.
How much do you spend on holidays?
amber tree leaves 
Hi ATL,
Nice article and good insights.
Since my kids are still in kindergarten, we are flexible with out holidays and travel mostly in May-june-july-dec-jan-feb.
Since I am almost 4-6 months on road, cost is a major challenge for me.
our 2 weeks of Mallorca holiday at a nice beach with a swimmingpool in condominium costed us 2000€ all together for 4 persons (2adults and 2 kids of age 3/5yrs).
We got flights for 350€, took only 15 kgs all together, we do not rent a car but take taxi’s or public transport. Now and then we buy pizzas for kids but we mostly eat in holiday flat and mostly fruits, vegetables and local items. The most we spended on this holiday was a visit to caves and a train ride (old wooden toy train) from palma to soller. Rest we were on the beach bathing and wave surfing, in the pool, at kids play grounds, beach evening grills and music parties. Also made some good friends on that holiday. We liked it so much that we will repeat it next year.
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When you can travel outside the main season, prices are really lower. Those days are over for us… Our oldest is in first grade already.
Specific for Croatia, we took the rental to have the freedom and flexibility to go where we want. From Zadar to PAG is a one hour drive. We do not like the standard tours on offer.
Next year, we consider a holiday with our car.
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The pictures are fantastic! Really makes me want to go that direction (and we may next year).
But the costs, ouch, that’s a lot of money (have to remind myself that you are a family of 4…). We like to travel and currently have a yearly budget of ~ €2500 for it, plan to jack that up to €4000-5000 when FI. Probably need to ditch the car to make that happen.
As to driving to Croatia, we probably would, but we would make the trip a holiday on it’s own. As an example, we would have made it a 3 week trip, with half of that a road trip to the destination of Croatia. Savings = €1700 flights and car rental. Additional costs of €1200 in accommodation/food and about €300 in fuel costs (€1500 total). This could have stretched the €4000 to 3 weeks instead of 2 = €50/day. But you do have to have the time (and desire) to make this work. Just some thoughts.
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Appreciate your thoughts. We did consider it. It Would also mean more unpaid holiday. It is something we consider for a next holiday. Next year, we think of Spain in that way. We have our eyes on something 1100km away.
For Croatia, as you plan outside the main season, you can get housing much cheaper. We also took 2 bed room apartments. One bed room and sleep on couch sofa is cheaper. We just appreciated the extra bedroom.
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I would guess we are roughly at half what you guys spend but then again, no kids here, just the two of us. For your future travel budget, have you taken into account that once the kids are 16 they probably will not want to travel with the parents anymore? It could cut your future travel budget in half (my parents had the principle: travel with us and it is free, travel with your friends and you can do a summer job to pay for it).
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I think of something similar… And will put strong incentives to keep joining us. Then again, time will tell
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I think this was still a very economical holiday, and it sounded very relaxing! I spent two weeks last year in Vienna, Salzburg and Budapest and aside from airfares, it cost about 1600euro. Air B&B was very good in both locations, we saved a ton staying in a new listing in Budapest, the host had good reviews on their other ones so we were happy to trust the new one would be fine. The highlight for me was swimming in lake Fuschl (free, aside from the rental car to get there from Salzburg) and eating a 3 course meal in a Michelin Star restaurant in Budapest for about 40euro each. Europeans know how to have a good time!
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That sounds like a great holiday!
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That 40 euro’s for not wanting to cook could have easily be replaced by having some leftovers in the freezer which you’d only have to warm up. Saved us a couple times 😉
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Nice place to go. We sure spend less than you on our 2 eeks in France. We didn’t really forecast our spend. We arranged our days out according to the weather so the few rainy/cold days help to relax and watch some Harry Potter movies. Our rule is don’t overspend our monthly salary. A vacation with the car is therefore cheaper and no speeding tickets this time 🙂
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We had a parking ticket… We are in the process of finding out what holidays are for us. France by car will indeed be cheaper.
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Nice pictures!
We spent 2000 euro’s for the two of us for 3.5 weeks Spain/France including food. Eating out was really cheap in Spain, 12 euro’s for 3 course meal including wine! France is much more expensive. Camping was 16 euro’s a night. And we drove in our own car..
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Thx for sharing.
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Thanks for sharing your photos and experiences of your Croatia vacation. Some of my colleagues visited Croatia a while ago and loved it. We travel back to South Africa when we can afford to, otherwise, the trips are closer to San Francisco. OK, Hawaii is not THAT close, but we did visit there for the first time in May. We’ve also done 2×1-week cruises, which were lots of fun and very relaxing. It’s probably not for everybody, but we enjoyed them a lot.
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Yeah thx for sharing. Next time check skyscanner.nl 4 a rental car. For instance, you’ll pay 285€ for a stationwagon or 90€ for a super small car for the next 14 days in Croatia.
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Thx, I will add the site to my list.
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Lovely report! I never wrote it so many details… And I didn’t visit Croatia, even we have friends there! – I think we have a too long list 😀
We enjoy the holidays (2 every year) so I could have small suggestion to improve your budget a little:
– I found a taxi to transfer us, a little better than to pay airport fee parking: we have our friends witch are travelling too so we are going to their home, take it to drive and leave us in the airport and take back our car to park in front of their house (next month we are the driver 😀 for them).
– I cook before to leave. A part for the “airport” sandwiches, another in the freezer: when we turn back I just unfreeze and eat 😉
– hand luggage. we rent aprt. with washing machine so we have everyone his hand luggage.
Our last holiday was 1500 euro for 2 weeks in France . This covered campings (3, just 4-5 hours to drive to the next one), gas (in Luxembourg is cheap 😀 ), restaurant, a lot of outside activities, eat out (eat in front of the tent a grilled chicken bought locally is NOT eat out 😀 ). We tried once a restaurant Michelin – don’t do it with children – my daughter complained there is not pasta :))) plus almost 100 euro for “souvenirs” = food for home. We will repeat next summer to cover better the mountain area in France and to arrive to Chamonix.
Next holiday is planned for Christmas in Canary Islands, last experiences pushed the expenses up to 2500 euro – 3000 euro (2 weeks). Just we have a bad surprise: the host cancelled the reservation of the aprt. (that we paid 3 months ago….) and I am afraid this is changing my number…
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Lovely photos ATL!
I did Croatia way back in 2002/3 (Can’t actually remember now haha… too long ago) and have wanted to go back since. Great to get an idea of the cost, and interesting to note that the air travel and car hire seemed to cost just as much as the accommodation and eating/drinking budget.
I agree with your outlook on the spending, what’s the point of going away if you don’t eat out /go out and try to sample some of the local cuisine and attractions!
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