The cost of traveling

[D W]

At $5.65/gl for diesel, our only saving grace is the ability to limit out on fish every day and fill up the freezer. This last trip was a banner weekend for lake and rainbow trout. As seniors, we have Permanent Identification Cards that allow us to hunt, fish and trap without purchasing licenses.

[poppytoymaker]

Have a trip planed for Tybee Island Ga. in Oct, Had to cancell twice still have a deposit sitting there, hoping to go but who knows?

[Celticrider]

I wouldn’t call you guys South of the border lucky with the ridiculous cost of fuel, but I will say luckier. We in Canada are worse off.
Our regular gas now is 2.05/litre which is 9.22/ Gallon.
Now a lot of places are more than this , 2.25/ litre. Just over 10.00/gallon.
Our gallon is slightly bigger by .5/litre, but not enough of a difference to justify why we pay so much more.
We are heading to Eastern Canada and 5000km, 3000miles, it doubled from last year to approx 3400.00.
So you did over 8000 miles for roughly the same.
We get approx 10mpg with our 32’ pulling a car hauler so a little harder, but man does it take the fun out of it

[CaptnJohn]

Even when fuel was 1/3 the cost I read here often “if you have to worry about fuel costs you are in the wrong hobby” . More true today than a couple years ago.

[Dirthawg_]

Originally Posted by yukongold

food costs - don't consider them part of the trip. We would have had to eat at home, too, so food was not a consideration since we shopped and cooked just like at home.

It's not fair to strike food costs from the camping trip but include them in the hotel car trip. Your not comparing apples to apples.

I won't argue, traveling with a camper is cheaper but if you are comparing costs you have to compare all costs. Food, lodging, fuel etc. You should a least add the cost of what your normal grocery bill would be back at home to the camper trip or deducting that same grocery bill from the hotel trip. It will still be cheaper to travel with the camper but the numbers won't be 50% like your showing in your comparison.

[mnoland30]

I won't be traveling to Canada anytime soon.

Lake Powell was 400 ft. deep, and is now only 225. It is different every time we go. Luckily, two of the boat ramps are now open. Pray for rain.

[Rekab]

Great analytical email yukongold plus RV’ing is just fun.

[WayneG]

I think the difference is that when hoteling unless you have a kitchen there’s no choice but to eat in restaurants. We’ve (2) been vacation travelling for the past 20 years and it’s been difficult in the last 10 years to keep the cost below $3500 a week. Hotels for $100 bucks are pretty much a thing of the past, realistically if you want access to a pool or beach it’s $175 to $250 a night. Add $150/day for meals, then rental car plus flight ouch.
We flew/hotel travelled to Florida in 2020 for 16 days and didn’t get a car one week and managed to keep the cost below $7000.
We just got back in April from Indio round trip 23 days, 3000 miles in our MH pulling SUV, stayed in a luxury resort, pools, tennis, etc. Counting restaurants out 5 times total was under $5000. This does not count groceries, we had the choice to eat and drink like we’re at home.
I guess if you count amortizing the cost of the MH for 20 years plus maintenance it probably evens out for shorter trips but for long stays, the RV travel cost average declines.
Plus, you get to sleep in your own bed every night, you get to take your pets and you meet the nicest people everywhere because you have something already in common.

Wayne

[moose074]

Originally Posted by Dirthawg_

It's not fair to strike food costs from the camping trip but include them in the hotel car trip. Your not comparing apples to apples.



I won't argue, traveling with a camper is cheaper but if you are comparing costs you have to compare all costs. Food, lodging, fuel etc. You should a least add the cost of what your normal grocery bill would be back at home to the camper trip or deducting that same grocery bill from the hotel trip. It will still be cheaper to travel with the camper but the numbers won't be 50% like your showing in your comparison.

I would have to respectfully disagree, when we go camping short trips or long trips. We unload our household refrigerator into or 5th Wheel. We may not eat spaghetti or burritos with the ground meat as we are more likely to grill burgers, chicken or hotdogs. Those are what we eat at home as well. Nobody is stocking up the hotel fridge to head to another city in day or two and most on long trips aren’t carrying ice chest full of milk juice sandwich meats and boxes full of canned goods. Location to location then hoping you have microwave to cook with. Majority of people staying in hotels when traveling are eating out at $9 plus a meal verses groceries that would have been bought if at home for just a few bucks a meal. I always count food when calculating hotel trips due to the inconvenience. I don’t count them pulling a trailer because I eat the same groceries I would if at home.

[richguess]

I generally agree, BUT: there are exceptions. I was taking my RV up to Mammoth from SoCal. No wife, no dog this trip. Fly fishing at a friend’s place. Around 800 miles, probably 7-8 mpg in my Class A gasser with a toad. I instead loaded my cooler, stayed at a nice VRBO (4 nites) for $600. Drove our RAV4 prime (36 mpg) and had no white knuckles. Staying longer would have tilted things in favor of the RV, but this worked out great. Gas is >$6/gallon in CA.

[Civilguy]

Originally Posted by WayneG

I think the difference is that when hoteling unless you have a kitchen there’s no choice but to eat in restaurants. We’ve (2) been vacation travelling for the past 20 years and it’s been difficult in the last 10 years to keep the cost below $3500 a week. Hotels for $100 bucks are pretty much a thing of the past, realistically if you want access to a pool or beach it’s $175 to $250 a night. Add $150/day for meals, then rental car plus flight ouch.

I also tracked our vacation costs as a couple for twenty years before we retired a few years back, and it basically always seemed to run about $3,500 a week for us too. That included plane flights, airport parking, rental cars, lodgings and having all or most meals out. At this cost, we generally didn't have any "special" expenses like helicopter or boat tours or that sort of thing, just museum entries and relatively minor expenses like that.

Now it seems that meal and lodging and transportation costs have been rapidly spiraling upward for a couple of years.

We're just wrapping up a bit over five weeks on the road with the trailer, covering about 3,200 miles towing, plus some additional milage driving without the trailer. It currently looks like the cost of the trip will run somewhere around $5,000 to $6,000 all-in. That includes groceries and about ten meals out. While we generally prepare pretty good meals, it imposes the associated overhead of doing all the shopping, prep, and cleanup. To make things a bit easier, we primarily stay at places with at least partial utility hookups. So, it's a different style of travel.

Factoring in the cost of the trailer is difficult as in this crazy market our trailer is currently worth more than we paid for it; lead times to have a new one built are currently 15 months or more. So, the current depreciation cost on the trailer would be tough to figure as we are currently actually gaining value. However, I anticipate that will eventually change over time.

Meanwhile, I think we'll take the "savings" from our trailer travels this year and use them towards the cost of a European River cruise or some other silly thing. That's what being gainfully retired means to me.

[TheWolfPaq82]

I honestly don't know of anyone that does 17 states, 42 days and use hotels. Seem only campers ever run that much.

[glen1971]

Originally Posted by moose074

Majority of people staying in hotels when traveling are eating out at $9 plus a meal verses groceries that would have been bought if at home for just a few bucks a meal. I always count food when calculating hotel trips due to the inconvenience. I don’t count them pulling a trailer because I eat the same groceries I would if at home.

Where does one get a $9 meal at, other than fast food 3 times a day? Any place I've eaten recently it's got to be closer to $15 pee meal. And I'm guessing restaurants in popular National Parks are comparable to up here? My wife and I went for supper in Waterton the other night. She had a steak sandwich and a cooler and I had smoked pork and a beer, and a slice of cheesecske for dessert and it was $105, plus tip. I know that we can do a lot of eating in our trailer for that same price tag.

[RamblerGuy]

We made an 8,500 mile, three month trip in our Sunseeker towing a Pathfinder starting two days after I retired in April, 2011. Gas cost an average of $3.71 per gallon. Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Products Calculator that same buying power would be $4.80 per gallon today. The gas price was about flat from 2011 through mid-2014, then it dropped and stayed below $3.00 per gallon until it began to rise in early 2021. So at $5.00 per gallon it's not a lot more than it was ten years ago, but it sure hurts after over five years of $2 to $3 gas.


I've seen campground fees increase more than 50% since 2011, too. Even state parks have increased their fees a lot.


As for comparing it to the cost of traveling in a car, don't forget to include the cost of your RV and its upkeep, plus the extra cost for a truck to pull it or a car to tow compared to whatever you would be driving otherwise.


RV'ing isn't cheap, but it's a much better way to travel, at least for us.

[RickV]

Originally Posted by CaptnJohn

Even when fuel was 1/3 the cost I read here often “if you have to worry about fuel costs you are in the wrong hobby” . More true today than a couple years ago.

When we first started RVing 12 years ago we knew going in that it was gonna be costly and it has been 😂. That being said the last 3 years we have traveled out west for around 5 months at a time. This year before fuel prices went crazy we had decided to stay east this year. In previous years it would cost me around $100 every time we moved to a new location, so far this year it is around $150-$175. The good thing is we will be only traveling half the distance that we have in previous years. Right now we are in Vermont and heading up to the White Mountains in New Hampshire today then on up to NE Maine for a mouth and a half. Our biggest fears are not being able to get fuel to start working our way south and getting a basic necessity "Food". We have kinda became "Hoarders" we keep the Pantry and Fridge full.

[moose074]

Originally Posted by glen1971

Where does one get a $9 meal at, other than fast food 3 times a day? Any place I've eaten recently it's got to be closer to $15 pee meal. And I'm guessing restaurants in popular National Parks are comparable to up here? My wife and I went for supper in Waterton the other night. She had a steak sandwich and a cooler and I had smoked pork and a beer, and a slice of cheesecske for dessert and it was $105, plus tip. I know that we can do a lot of eating in our trailer for that same price tag.

I agree and not sure fast food unless you order off of the value menu any more. I didn’t want to throw out huge number. There are those that are able to find a bargain though.

[moose074]

Originally Posted by RamblerGuy

We made an 8,500 mile, three month trip in our Sunseeker towing a Pathfinder starting two days after I retired in April, 2011. Gas cost an average of $3.71 per gallon. Using the Bureau of Labor Statistics Consumer Products Calculator that same buying power would be $4.80 per gallon today. The gas price was about flat from 2011 through mid-2014, then it dropped and stayed below $3.00 per gallon until it began to rise in early 2021. So at $5.00 per gallon it's not a lot more than it was ten years ago, but it sure hurts after over five years of $2 to $3 gas.


I've seen campground fees increase more than 50% since 2011, too. Even state parks have increased their fees a lot.


As for comparing it to the cost of traveling in a car, don't forget to include the cost of your RV and its upkeep, plus the extra cost for a truck to pull it or a car to tow compared to whatever you would be driving otherwise.


RV'ing isn't cheap, but it's a much better way to travel, at least for us.

I want to thank you I learned something new today, I had never heard of that calculator and I went to check it out. While I probably misread or misunderstood your post. As I always have learned that inflation makes things cost more. So when I put in the $3.11 I get $4.13 . Which to me means that if gas was still $3.11 I would only have the buying power to buy 3/4 of a gallon.
However since the price of gas is constantly changing and not at the rate of inflation I don’t think it’s an accurate comparison. I’m not an economist and I didn’t sleep at a Holiday Inn. But imagine that same $3.11 in 2011 only gets a little over half a gallon today

[MilCop4523]

Originally Posted by yukongold

I know that fuel prices have gone up significantly in just the past few weeks but I still think RV'ing, in whatever you may have, is still a bargain and a good way to travel. Fuel costs are outrageous and people have every right to complain, but when all is said and done and all factors are considered it's still a great way to see the country.
If you stay in hotels/motels and eat out or (God forbid) travel by airplane you will, I think, spend considerably more and see less.

Go and enjoy.

thank you for the break down.
Gas is still a lot cheaper than what we are paying here in Canada 1 mile away from the second largest refinery on the east coast. we are paying $2.16 here per liter. X 4.54 liters in our gallon it cost me $110 dollars yesterday to put less than .5 of a tank into our 2022 F250 7.3 gasser.
this summer we will be vacationing in the states with our trailer vs Canada where it seems everything isalmost double the price.

[JimEastTexas]

We can take our dogs with us, kennel costs is another savings

[PHISHN2]

Originally Posted by mnoland30

Lake Powell was 400 ft. deep, and is now only 225. It is different every time we go. Luckily, two of the boat ramps are now open. Pray for rain.

I hate it, but it's going to take more than rain to replenish Powell. Before any of the water even gets there it is consumed by thousands of homes and ranchers / farmers. Way more of those today than 60 years ago, especially in western Colorado. On a trip to Oregon from Kansas last summer we noticed a LOT of new hemp farms around the Grand Junction area. Hemp needs a significant amount of water.

For rain to replenish Powell (and Mead, for that matter) it is going to require a decade or more of considerable above average snowfall and rainfall in the western basin. While that is certainly possible, it is not very likely. What is more likely is that Powell and Mead are on their last legs as useful water storage facilities.