Living The Dream: Costs

Freycinet Peninsula, Tasmania. A nice place to hang out for a few days marathon training. I put in a couple of magnificent 12 milers here, round the Hazards-Wineglass Bay loop, at the crack of dawn while most of the tourists and hikers were still fast asleep.

What a dream. But how much did it cost?

Cost:

Youth hostel accomodation/night = AU$24.

Food for a day = around AU$10, depending on what you can find on the hostel's free food shelf.

Entertainments = running (free), sun-bathing (free), reading (free book off the hostel's exchange shelf), writing/drawing (cost of a biro and a notepad - a cent or two per day), conversation with interesting people (included in price of hostel), likewise any TV viewing.

Thats AU$34 for one's day's simple but blissful living, or £14.50 in UK money! How many hours work is that? 2.5 hours on the minimum wage. Less if you're lucky enough to be able to command more cash for your labour.

Now, ok, maybe it's not as simple as that. An airflight from the UK to Australia is a hefty price (besides being desperately bad for the environment, something I'll deal with on this blog some other day). But if you work out the cost of a round the world/return ticket of approximately £1000, across 365 days... Comes out as £2.74/day! That's less than a daily commute costs just about anywhere in the UK, unless you walk to and from work.

And yeah sure, if you want to be super pernickety, there are other costs: The clothes on your back. Running trainers and shorts. Deodorant, soap, shampoo, toothbrush... etc etc. The list goes on, but not indefinitely. With a minimal kit bag of essential gear (a lot of which can be picked up for free on the road from hostels' free-shelves or other travellers moving on), the cost spreads out very cheaply over several months of travel. Probably a lot cheaper than your lifestyle at home.

It certainly cost me a fraction of my lifestyle at home, and I'm not a particularly extravagant person. For somewhere in the region of £20/day, I was able to live my dream.