The UK is supposed to be the most expensive stop on this year long adventure which is why we only spent about 15 days in Scotland and England combined. Personally, I always heard London was stupid expensive so I think I was more prepared as opposed to Ireland where I just didn’t know as much going in. Here is the breakdown:
Lodging - This section is about 7 days of camping and 7 days of London. The camping helped keep this lower than it could have been but campsights are still going to run about $30/night. This number also includes camping gear.
Food and Drink - Camping was all crackers, beans, and fruit. London was all eating out. So the two probably equal each other out
Transportation - This number is hard to keep down in the U.K. Gas is expensive. We would try and fill up the rental car every time we got to about a half a tank just in case, and that fill up runs around $50. We put 1,200+ miles which means we had to fill up probably 5 times. When you get to London then you will have some decisions to make about how you want to get around but where you are staying will dictate that. We stayed in Greenwich which is a little ways outside the city. We decided to go with the Oyster card which is a pay as you go card on all methods of transportation at a discounted rate. In the end we needed about 45-50 pounds on each card which matches up with everything we read (around $120).
Activities - I covered this in the London post but this price will be as high or as low as you decide to make it. If you want to see it ALL then it will be high and if you decide to just look at things from the outside then it will be low. Pretty simple. The Tower of London is $35/ticket. Hampton Court, Churchill War Rooms, and Westminster are all going to be in the $27/ticket range. The giant ferris wheel is $50/ticket. So as you can see, if you want to see it all then you’re going to pay for it but if you elect to just look at the ferris wheel and palaces then you can keep this a bit lower. We simply prioritized the list of attractions and made it to the areas we deemed a must visit and skipped the ones we were just lukewarm on.
Summary - Luckily we just spent a couple of weeks here! We loved our time here and have no doubt we will be back someday but it is a tough place when you’re on a strict budget. I am not saying we will hit our goal from here on out or that saving $$ will be a lot easier but it is good to know that the most expensive city is now behind us.