ONE MONTH IN THAILAND
Originally, we had hopes of keeping our cost to less than $100/day in Thailand, which is completely do-able. However, electing to go with air-conditioning over a fan, first class cabins over second class, 3-star hotels over hostels, and signing up for day trips and activities have added to our cost. What makes Thailand amazing for travelers is that despite all our upgrades, we are still way within our intended budget of $150/day.
Interestingly, costs haven't changed a whole lot for travelers since Mike backpacked through Thailand, 16 years ago, except for beach resort towns that have doubled/tripled in price. He was on a "stricter" budget structure at that time than we are today, but the cost of food, beers, lodging, and transportation has been steady.
The thing about Thailand is, spending more money doesn't necessarily equate to a better experience. The best experiences involve going to dive bars, eating street food, meandering through the chaos of Bangkok, riding tuk-tuks, meeting locals, trekking in the jungles, taking local public transport, etc. Hiding at a manufactured 5-star resort offers no glimpse into the real Thailand. We do not exaggerate with the word "manufacture". The Four Seasons in Chiang Mai has literally created a mini-Thailand landscape, complete with rice fields, water buffaloes, and elephants so that guests do not have to leave the compound to experience "Thailand". It's great for a movie set, but how ridiculous otherwise? We especially thought the pool in the middle of the rice fields was a "nice" touch.
As our month in Thailand draws to a close, here's a recap of our expenses. You know the drill...
TOTAL
We spent $3305 over 26 days in Thailand. That comes to $127/day. Not bad, although, it could be done at half the cost...no problem.
LODGING
Total $744 or $28/day. You can't stay in a roach motel for less than $30/day in the States. For an average of $28/day, we actually "splurged" and stayed in hotels with A/C, refrigerator, private baths, breakfast, good location, etc.
TRANSPORTATION
Total $468 or $18/day. If you look at Thailand on the map, you'll see that that it is long and skinny. That means, great distances to travel north to Chiang Mai and south towards the beaches of Ko Samui or Phuket. Buses are cheaper, but since we were traveling like "royalty", we opted for overnight train travel. $325 of the total was spent on 4 legs (to/from Bangkok-Chiang Mai; to/from Bangkok-Ko Samui) of first class, private, overnight cabins on trains. The remainder was a combo of taxis, ferry, buses, and renting a motor bike for a week.
MEALS
Total $841 (gasp!) or $32/day. Really, this is outrageous and uncalled for. We are really ruining the reputation of Thailand as a cheap place for food by posting these numbers. We definitely had a long streak of eating Thai street food for less than $5/meal for 2 people. Yup...totally cheap. However, when we got to Chiang Mai - expat capital, we kinda went overboard with eating western foods, and that is never cheap in a foreign country. Also, we walked out of Hard Rock Cafe - Bangkok short of $80, and we went to a couple of swanky restaurants in Ko Samui. So, all-in-all, it's ironic that one of our most expensive meal days...ever...was in a country with one of the cheapest food costs. However, in comparison to the other countries, we have spent far less on meals than the daily average of $45 over the past 6 months.
DRINKS
Total $675 or $26/day. This is definitely the highest daily average in drinks. No, it's not all alcohol! It includes the mandatory bottled water to brush our teeth with and drink from, soda, tea, coffee, etc. However, we must admit that beers in Thailand are not cheap. And, perhaps it had something to do with our late nights at the blues bar in Bangkok...It definitely offsets the cheap lodging and food...
ATTRACTIONS/ADMISSIONS
Total $366 or $14/day. We felt like we had a lot more cushion to spend on extracurricular activities in Thailand than anywhere else, so we allocated quite a bit of cash to do some zip lining and elephant riding in Chiang Mai, paying admissions to the palace and wats in Bangkok, going to see a Muay Thai boxing match, etc.
MEDICAL
Total $44. Most of this was spent on mosquito repellant. Yup. Give me the highest DEET percentage you've got. Higher the DEET = higher the cost, but we didn't care.
PERSONAL CARE
Total $112 or $4/day. Although some of the cost went to a hair cut or shave (although we should've received a freebie after a slight miscommunication about the word "shave" versus "cut-off".), most of the cost went towards Thai massages! The current going rate for an hour massage was somewhere between $5/hour to $10/hour, depending on the location.
CLOTHES/LAUNDRY
Total $55 or $2/day. Ahhhhhh...After a big laundromat dry spell in the Balkans, we are back to getting our laundry done for about $2/load! A very important service in a very hot and sweaty country.
POSTCARDS/POSTAGE
Total $21, a minor cost to stay in touch with our friends and family! Beats the $3/postcard postage we got charged in Ecuador!
FEES
Total $51. $33 of this was the standard 1% surcharge for withdrawing money from the ATM machines. Fortunately, with our Etrade account, they reimburse us for the additional ATM transaction fee, which happens to be $5/transaction in Thailand - one of the highest we've seen in all our travels. Unfortunately, we had to cancel one of our Etrade ATM cards when a bank machine ate the card in Bangkok. Fortunately, banks issue separate ATM card numbers, even for the same bank account. So, we still have access to the account with the one card we have left for Etrade, and the one card we have left for our BofA account (after canceling our other ATM card due to fraudulent activity). We also have a couple of credit cards where we could advance cash in a pinch, but that's our very, very last resort!
