Tag: Family Trip

4 Days in The Bahamas Budget Breakdown

Back with another budget breakdown for you all.

I feel like this may be the shortest/most succinct one I will ever post.

I plan on spending the Canadian Thanksgiving Long Weekend in Nassau, The Bahamas. After flying over The Bahamas back in February when I was going to Antigua, I said to myself that I MUST go there soon and see it up close.

This trip is also special because this is #50! Yay! This makes it fifty countries I have somehow managed to travel to while not being rich or a flight attendant. Feeling pretty good.

Below is a photo of the budget breakdown I keep on my Excel spreadsheet:

For this vacation (you see I said vacation instead of trip, because for the first time in a long time – I plan on doing absolutely nothing) – I will be going with my mom and dad.

The flight was a good price, I think.

We got the roundtrip, direct flight for $493.00 per person. This is with WestJet and we booked it back in March because we knew the long weekend price would skyrocket. I was right….

This is the exact same flight we are taking for the exact same dates, yeah. From $493.00 to $1392.00 roundtrip per person. I’ll stay happy with the price we got ours for.

We originally had another place booked, but it seemed to be a bit of a walk to the beach, so we changed hotels in July.

The new choice was Sandyport Beach Resort.

I mean, look at this place. You can see why the choice was pretty easy. It is beachfront and quiet. Although I plan on returning one day to Nassau to party hard, this is not going to be one of those trips. I truly intend on just laying on the beach all day and trying not to burn.

Seems like the perfect place for me to do all of that.

The cost of 3-nights at Sandyport is $1078.00 for the Standard Room, so $359.33 per person.

For this trip, NO TESTING IS REQUIRED. This is also a direct flight, so no worries about testing requirements for layovers either. Also, ArriveCan is done now for coming home. Yay.

If you ever want to know testing requirements for whatever trip you have planned, make sure to check the Sherpa website. It is great because I can input that I am a Canadian citizen, fully vaccinated, traveling from where and to where + what my layover is. Then the website gives me a total breakdown of everything required for the trip. Fantastic. Such a big help.

I know The Bahamas is pricy. This is not somewhere I’d consider a budget destination. I am very very aware.

I exchanged $375.00 Canadian into $300USD for this trip. I’m not even sure between taxis and how much conch I intend on consuming if that will cut it for four days. But, I figure this was a good number to start with and plus I have my parents with me to manage any other costs.

The total budget for this trip is $1227.33 Canadian for me.

Pretty damn excited to see Nassau, I have to say. The closeness of this destination is crazy, I have done many itineraries for people to visit and never even took in how short of a flight it is.

Promise this will not be my last time visiting this country. Next time, hopefully, I’ll have time to party and visit the Exumas.

  • Mirna

10 Days in Peru Budget Breakdown

I feel like it has been FOREVER since my trip to Ecuador.

Here I am again with a budget breakdown for you nice people, because I am all for travel pricing transparency. Also, I feel like this is a place many people would like to travel to, so I wanted to give as much information as possible about it.

Below is a photo of the budget breakdown I keep on my Excel spreadsheet:

I divided everything in two as I am doing this trip with my mom! Super excited about it. Peru is one of those bucket list places, and being able to travel there with my mom makes it even better.

First we started with the flights.

As you can see on the above Excel sheet screenshots, the flight(s) for this trip were booked way back on January 27th. Our roundtrip flight from Toronto to Lima, with American Airlines, was $719.61 per person. (we have a quick layover in Miami there, and one in Dallas on way back) The flight from Lima to Cusco was also booked at this time for $158.50 per person, roundtrip, direct with Latam Airlines.

So far I’ve had decent experiences with AA, but this will be my first time using Latam and will update on how that experience was when I return.

For this trip we actually have three different stays:

3 nights in Lima, Peru

4 nights in Cusco, Peru

2 nights in Lima, Peru

When we arrive we begin our trip in Lima, where we will be landing.

We figured to get somewhat acclimatized to the altitude, it was best to spend more than just a night in Lima. For this portion of the trip we are staying in a two-bedroom and two-bathroom AirBnB. The place looked awesome in the photos, had perfect reviews and a great location. Total cost for the 3-nights was $235.96 so it was $117.98 per person. Will let you know how the AirBnB was when I get back, but if you’re interested the link to it is here.

After Lima we will fly over to Cusco and stay 4-nights in a hotel called El Balcón. The location of this place looks great for exploring Cusco, the reviews are great and breakfast is included in the cost of the stay. Total for a triple room is $204.00, which is $102.50 per person. I think for 4-nights that is outstanding.

Following Cusco and visiting Machu Picchu, we return to Lima for 2-nights before our flight home, and for that we opted to book a hotel.

The hotel name is Hotel Estelar San Isidro, and the cost was $156.00, so $78.00 per person. This is for the Standard Twin Room and breakfast is included in the price. The hotel looks great and seems to be the perfect choice to wind down before we fly home.

For this trip, NO TESTING IS REQUIRED. The layover in the USA doesn’t require it either, fantastic. I will note here though, the testing would have been required if we both didn’t have three shots. Literally leading up to the day we fly I just happened to read those with only two shots would also need a negative rapid test. Luckily, we both have two + booster so we were good to go, no test needed.

If you ever want to know testing requirements for whatever trip you have planned, make sure to check the Sherpa website. It is great because I can input that I am a Canadian citizen, fully vaccinated, traveling from where and to where + what my layover is. Then the website gives me a total breakdown of everything required for the trip. Fantastic. Such a big help.

Now for spending money I’ve looked up what food costs are etc.

I exchanged $350.00 Canadian into $1100.00 SOL, which is the local currency in Peru. I have no idea if this will or won’t be enough, another thing I will update on when I return. Doesn’t look like food costs and Uber costs are that egregious, but I have been known to spend a fortune on food and liquor. *shrugs*

Finally, the one big ticket item for this trip is the tour from Cusco to Machu Picchu. No way we were going to visit Peru without seeing this magical place.

There was a lot of tour options, but we ended up choosing this one, found on Viator.

This is a lengthy day trip that I think requires taking two busses and a train to finish the whole thing. We will definitely be gone the whole day, I can’t wait. The cost was $474.31 per person. Fine by me.

The total budget for this trip is $2000.90 Canadian for me.

I bet Peru can be done for a much cheaper budget, but what the heck. I am traveling with my mom and I’d like to have comfortable accommodations with very good reviews, plus I am gone for 10-days.

For me, the money spent to see one of the Seven Wonders of The World feels very much worth it.

Will let you know how it all goes when I return!

  • Mirna

4 Days in Ecuador Budget Breakdown

Yes I know I was literally in Europe last week. But….

What had happened was, I saw another deal earlier this year and capitalized on it. It isn’t my fault it fell on the weekend after another trip. Even better, this was a long weekend! Yay.

This trip was for myself, my boyfriend and his 13-year-old daughter. She is graduating grade 8 and this is a nice little graduation trip/gift. Also, she speaks Spanish fluently and that will be a super duper bonus in Ecuador.

Below is a photo of the budget breakdown I keep on my Excel spreadsheet:

I divided everything in three (obviously she didn’t pay for anything) but because she counts as a whole adult human at 13 when bookings things like flights and hotels, I just wanted to show you guys an accurate budget.

So I had seen another deal with Avianca Airlines – as I did for my Costa Rica trip last month. There was a roundtrip flight from Toronto via Bogota to Guayaquil, Ecuador. Total cost for the flight was $526.00 per person, roundtrip. I thought that was a pretty good deal, so my boyfriend and I booked it. I really enjoyed my last experience with Avianca, hope this will be just as good.

Because I wanted this to be a well-priced trip, but also something really nice for her, I found a really an awesome deal for a 5-star hotel in Guayaquil.

This is the Radisson Hotel Guayaquil. It is a 5-star hotel, with a nice pool, awesome location and breakfast is also included in the price of the room.

I know the title of the post is ‘4 days‘ but the trip is technically five days, I just didn’t count the day we fly home because we leave SO early.

The cost of this hotel for 4-nights is $459.00, therefore $153.00 per person. For some nice 5-star living? Why not? I checked waaay after booking it to see what the prices were like again and it was almost double the amount we booked it for. Early booking for the win, again.

For this trip, NO TESTING IS REQUIRED. The layover in Bogota doesn’t require it, the arrival in Ecuador doesn’t and the return to Canada vis San Salvador does not as well.

If you ever want to know testing requirements for whatever trip you have planned, make sure to check the Sherpa website. It is great because I can input that I am a Canadian citizen, fully vaccinated, traveling from where and to where + what my layover is. Then the website gives me a total breakdown of everything required for the trip. Fantastic. Such a big help.

Please don’t call me dumb, but I had no idea that the currency in Ecuador was USD. What the heck?

Luckily, this doesn’t seem to be a place things cost much (even in USD) and I also have my boyfriend to pay for things with me. I decided to bring $250.00 USD on this trip for spending money so total $320.00 Canadian.

The total budget for this trip is $999.00 Canadian for me.

I bet that Ecuador can be done for cheaper but, eh. Sometimes you have to indulge a little bit and I think a graduation trip for someone special is a great time to do so.

Can’t wait to come back and tell you all about how Ecuador was!

  • Mirna

5 Days in Costa Rica Budget Breakdown

Here I am again, spilling the beans on how much I spend on my vacations.

Thank goodness, after Antigua and Miami – this one seems WAY more reasonable in pricing.

This upcoming Victoria Day long weekend, my parents and I are heading to Costa Rica! Yay. This will be country #45 for me, and I am super duper excited to get to visit this country, as well as being able to do it with my favourite people in the world.

Below is a photo of the budget breakdown I keep on my Excel spreadsheet:

CostaRicaTripCost

Let us start with the flight.

There was a moment where Avianca Airlines had crazy deals for people flying from Toronto all over Central and South America. We were lucky enough to be able to grab this deal during that time. The cost of the roundtrip flight from Toronto to San Jose, per person, was $327.00 – with carry-on luggage. That is freaking insane to me. What a deal! We booked in February and that is usually ‘late’ for me to book anything, but sometimes these deals come up and you have to take advantage like we did.

Immediately after booking the flight I got to working on a place to stay in San Jose. Luckily I had done so many itineraries to this city, that I actually had a couple of them saved for myself.

AirBNB San Jose

The place has two bedrooms, two bathrooms and this beautiful pool. Also, everyone in the reviews said the location is great so it was an easy choice.

Total cost was $438.85 – so per person it came to $146.28 for the 5-night stay. Now I know the title of this post is ‘5 Days in Costa Rica‘ and the math is NOT mathing. The reason I made the title that is because we land super late on the Thursday and take off super duper early on the Tuesday morning to come home. So I couldn’t really say that’s a 6-day trip you know?

If any of you are interested in this AirBnB, here is the link to it. On my follow-up recap of this trip I will let you know if it was worth it and location etc.

Also, we have a second stay during this trip.

No way we could visit Costa Rica and not go to a beach destination!

For one of the nights, we plan on going and doing a trip to Jaco Beach. I know there are plenty of awesome beach destinations in this country, but because we are there for such a short time, we went for the popular and closest one. From my research it is only about 90 minutes each way from San Jose to get there.

We booked a one-night stay at Selina Jaco for this.

SelinaJaco

The total for a night here was $155.45 – therefore per person it is $51.81 and that is totally cool with me because breakfast is included and it is beachfront. For a one-night getaway, this will be awesome.

For this trip, hallelujah, NO TESTING IS REQUIRED. The layover in San Salvador doesn’t require it, the arrival in Costa Rica doesn’t and the return to Canada does not as well.

If you ever want to know testing requirements for whatever trip you have planned, make sure to check the Sherpa website. It is great because I can input that I am a Canadian citizen, fully vaccinated, traveling from where and to where + what my layover is. Then the website gives me a total breakdown of everything required for the trip. Fantastic. Such a big help.

Now the final thing is spending money.

Usually I bring $500 USD on every trip I go to, but for such a short trip to a place where my currency isn’t trash? I only am counting $300CAD, which is 154,036CRC (Costa Rican Colon). Furthermore, I’m going with the bank of mom and dad, duh! I intend on capitalizing being an only child very much on this family excursion.

The grand total for this trip to San Jose and Jaco, Costa Rica is $825.09 per person – I think that’s not so bad. I know I definitely could have found cheaper AirBnB’s in San Jose and likely a cheaper place in Jaco, but I’m traveling with my parents. I am not putting them in some of the shenanigans I end up in. No way. They deserve some comfort, and I still think the price worked out to be really good.

I’m really looking forward to this trip with them and I can’t wait to tell all of you how it went when I get back!

  • Mirna