South America on a Shoestring

It’s that time again – time for me to look back on our time in South America and obsess about how much money we spent.  Here’s the breakdown of what we spent for 111 days in South America:

We spend a month in Argentina, 6 weeks in Peru, and 5 weeks in Brazil.

Lodging: $2615

We stayed in hostels, bed & breakfasts or cheap hotels pretty much 100% of the time.

Food (including alcohol): $3196

Most of the time, breakfast was included with our lodging, so we mostly only had to pay for lunch and dinner.  Cooking for ourselves was a lot more challenging in South America compared to camping in Eastern Europe, so we ate out more – probably about

75% of the time.

Entertainment and/or Activities: $2446

This includes our Inca Trail hike, which cost just over $1000.  Also, lots of surf rentals and a few tours.

Necessities (clothing, shampoo, internet, sending packages home etc): $1738

Transportation: $2929

No car for this leg of the trip, so transportation was buses, taxis, and flights.

All for a grand total of $12924…

If you look back at our post about our expenses in Eastern Europe, you’ll see that we spent $12521 in 94 days.  We were actually really surprised that South America ended up costing so much – we thought it would be much cheaper.  Peru was very inexpensive, but Brazil was only marginally cheaper than Canada, and Argentina was not too far behind.  But it was definitely worth it. 

Let the adventures in Australia begin!!!