In this ongoing series, Barbara Dawson embarks on a two-month vacation in Europe with her family and is investigating how frugality and high adventure can come together to create a once in a lifetime family experience.
The Prep
What would make two very frugal, regular people like my husband and me drop our lives, pull our two young daughters out of school, and head to Europe for two months?
Like every parent, we want to broaden our children's minds, make learning fun and offer them an opportunity to use their language and public speaking skills. But spending two months with our kids, every moment of every day without a moment of respite?
Insane... but here's the thing;
1) My 9 year old daughter, who until recently thought I was the funniest, smartest, most beautiful Mummy in the world, has started to say things like: "That's not funny Mummy", and "Don't do anything to embarrass me, okay!". The wonder years don't last forever.
2) I just finished a really great contract with a wonderful company that was the pinnacle of my career. Now I'm wondering what's next for me.
3) We have a pile of money that is just going to go bad if we don't use it. Not really, but there is a possibility that we could do this without spending a lot of cash.
My husband and I went to Europe together 13 years ago travelling on $30 a day each. I think it says something about our relationship that we got married anyway. We are notorious cheapskates. In fact some would call us pathological. Now that we are planning this trip, we are trying to find the least expensive way to make it happen without going over in sea containers and eating PB&J everyday. Though it can be exhausting and take way more time than paying full price, we get very excited when we save money.
The first thing I did was to go to some of the frugal traveler websites; lonelyplanet.com, fodors.com, ricksteves.com. Many people will post their own experiences on these sights and answer questions for you. Rick Steves is a penny pinchers dream come true. He recommends the best ways to travel no frills and has very affordable merchandise on his website. He even shows you how to do your laundry in the sink.
I talked to my kids' teachers, expecting to hear some concern about the children missing two months of school. Their reaction was unanimously "GO....and can you take the rest of the class too?". One teacher recommended we have the girls start a blog so that their fellow students can follow along on the trip. We can introduce them to history by seeing cave drawings and visiting Roman ruins. They will be speaking French and learning some Italian and Spanish so they can order their meals. We are bringing math books though...learning isn't supposed to be ALL fun.
I bought our Eurail pass from my buddy Rick Steves' website; 7 days travel for 2 months in 3 countries, half price for kids under 12! The trains are very good in Europe and quite reasonably priced, plus you always meet some eccentric individual that makes the voyage entertaining.
There is a real possibility that we will be carrying our own bags, our kids bags and potentially our kids, depending on the type of day we are having. Taking this into consideration I opted for a bag with wheels and backpack straps for the girls. They can drag it and whine at the same time without much effort and we can take it from them when they collapse into moaning, weeping heaps. I bought them on sale, two for $50! We got ourselves some Obusforme backpacks with great adjustable straps and daypacks that zip on and off. I got them for a great price at the Cub Scout store and got a 15% rebate because my daughter is a scout! I had to hide a small orgasm from the cashier that day as I reveled in the money I had saved.
Over the next few articles, I am hoping to unravel the secrets of planning a two-month trip with my family and executing it within a reasonable budget. Since I've never done it before, it's going to be a learning experience for both of us. Can you believe I found accommodation in Paris for 4 people for $70/night? I'll tell you more about that and let you in on our ever-changing itinerary next time.
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