Costs for cycling from Sweden to Thailand

One of the big questions before heading out on this journey was how big costs to expect. Various internet forums and other blogs suggested a budget frame of around 10-20 USD per day and person depending on country and type of accomodation. We had no clue if those figures were realistic or if we would be able to stick to such a budget. Out of curiosity we decided to note all our spendings in order to follow up on it afterwards. 

We have now gone through all our notes and can conclude that our total spending is slightly below 12.500 USD. The trip lasted 280 days including restdays and that means we have spent 44.5 USD per day together or 22.2 USD each.

A return ticket from Göteborg to Bangkok usually costs around 8000 SEK or 1200 USD. Our total costs for the cycling trip was roughly the same as the price of 10 individual return flights to Bangkok. Or if you put it in another way – cycling here together cost us the same as flying here together 5 times. Guess what we think has given most bang for the buck…. 😉

The chart below shows how the total cost were split among our different “accounts”.

Total traveling costs in USD

Total traveling costs in USD

The purpose of this blog post is to try to give a picture of how our costs for the 9.5 month long journey were distributed and we do hope it will be of some help to other cyclists who are in the planning phase. Before digging deep into the figures for each country it is necessary to give some relevant background facts.

Wej and I are in our mid-forties, have no kids and have worked for a very long time. This means that we have been able to allow ourselves a rather generous budget, or to be correct – we didn’t really have a budget, we used some of our savings and our only concern was to not spend all of it…. 🙂

 

ACCOMODATION

As can be seen above accomodation and food have been our highest cost and thus need to be elaborated on. One important thing to note is the ratio between paid vs unpaid nights that didn’t really turn out like we had planned to. Why it turned out this way is discussed in the sections below.

Skärmavbild 2014-03-08 kl. 13.03.40

Our expectations was to ride in sub-zero temperatures for maximum 3-4 weeks before the arrival of spring and then we hoped to enjoy warmer weather. We thus made the strategic decision to only bring a light tent and summer sleeping bags which meant that we had to stay at cheap hotels or guesthouses until night temperatures were above 3-4 degrees. Unfortunately the winter of 2013 in central Europe was extremely cold and we coulnd’t start camping until we reached Bulgaria.

We have done a few more longer stops than we had first planned. We stopped for about a week in Istanbul, Batumi, Tbilisi (due to injury), Osh, Chengdu (visa extension) and Kunming with 3-4 day stops in Baku, Sary Tash and Hami. During most of those stops we stayed either in hotels or hostels.

We don’t mind to stay in lousy guesthouses or camp behind a bush 10 meters beside the road, but since we haven’t had a too tight budget we have also sometimes allowed ourselves to opt for more expensive hotels with high standard rather than always going for the cheapest available option.

In Uzbekistan the rules requiring foreigners to register with the authorities by checking in at hotels forced us to stay more often at hotels and guesthouses than we actually would have preferred to.

 

FOOD

We are both very interested in local food culture which has meant that we have eaten more often at restaurants than what has been necessary. Of course we could have saved a lot of costs here, but to travel is to eat and we never wanted to cut back on trying interesting local cuisine.

We have noted all our costs for what we have consumed. In the early part of the trip we spent a lot of money on coffee at central european gas stations. After a month or so we understood that we should split prepared food that we buy in restaurants from snacks and drinks we buy along the road and stuff we buy in stores to cook by ourselves. This means that the pie chart below isn’t completely trustworthy and is a bit biased, but as anyone can see, there is a lot of money to save by not being too interested in local cuisine 😉

Distribution of food costs

Take a look at the chart below showing the average daily spending in each country. We have cut out things such as when we bought new equipment for our camera in Bulgaria and the tickets to the ferry rides across the Baltic and the Caspian Seas. Our two home countries, Sweden and Thailand, were the cheapest but that is mainly due to the fact that we have so many wonderful friends in those countries. The very high average for Azerbaijan was due to a short stay and a high visa fee and lots of taxi rides across the city of Baku to collect other visas. If we would have had to wait for the ferry for a couple of more days the average daily spending in Azerbaijan would have dropped significantly.

Daily expenses per country

 

COUNTRY BY COUNTRY

Below you will find a few charts for each country. They will show the ratio of paid vs. unpaid nights and the distribution between nights we have been invited to someone, camping, staying in hotels or guesthouses. Remember that the pie charts show the average cost for accomodation split on all nights in each country including nights when we have camped which brings down the average. As a service and clarification I will under the notes for each country also tell our average cost for each paid night.

There will also be a chart showing the distribution of the total cost and one how the cost for food was split in each country.

All costs that are shown are for two people. If you will travel on your own I think you can divide most of the figures by half to get a good approximation. When it comes to accomodation it will be harder since we can fill up a double room while a single traveler would have to pay for it by himself.

We have passed 15 countries using 15 different currencies so which one to use for these charts?  As I see it, it could be either US dollars or Euro and I opted for US Dollars. In the notes for each country I will state the exchange rate we have used when calculating.

The piecharts are made in excel and I have uploaded a print screen of them. They are rather small as they appear on a screen, but click on them and you can see them in a larger size.

 

Sweden

  • 1 USD = 6,7 SEK
  • Our total costs for 12 days in the country was 240 USD (1600 SEK)
  • Cost for ferry ticket across the Baltic Sea is not included in the daily average spending but it included in the total summary

Our two weeks in Sweden were a bit different to the rest of the trip. We visited friends along the way and didn’t spend anything on accomodation. Our only spendings were food along the way and some wine and food we brought to our hosts.

 

Poland

  • 1 USD = 3 zloty
  • Our total cost for the 12 days spent in Poland was 654 USD (2310 Zloty)
  • Average cost for each paid night was 47 USD
  • We never cooked ourselves

Pie charts Poland

 

Slovakia

  • 1 USD = 0,77 Euro
  • Our total cost for two nights was 124 USD (95 €)
  • The hotel room cost us 33 Euro and the Guesthouse was 30 Euro.

Slovakia was the smallest country we passed. It took two hours in one afternoon, one full day and then two more hours the third day before exiting to Hungary. We spent two nights in the country, one at a hotel and one at a backpackers guesthouse.  One of the nights we treated ourselves to with a great dinner which drove up the average daily cost.

 

Hungary

  • 1 USD = 220 Forint
  • Our total cost for 4 nights in the country was 292 USD (64300 Forint)
  • We never cooked ourselves

Hungary is also a small country which could have been passed in three days. Unfortunately we got stuck in a massive snowstorm and had to check in at an expensive hotel, then move to a cheaper B&B to wait for the roads to get cleared.

 

Romania

  • 1 USD = 3,25 Lei
  • Our total cost for two weeks in the country was 630 USD (2045 Lei)
  • Average cost per paid night was 28,5 USD
  • We never cooked ourselves

Cost distribution Romania

 

Bulgaria

  • 1 USD = 1,52 Leva
  • Our total costs for the 5 nights in the country was 192 USD (292 Leva)
  • Average costs per paid night was 30,5 USD

In Bulgaria we finally started to camp and cook for ourselves.

Pie chart Bulgaria

 

Turkey

  • 1 USD = 1,53 TL (Turkish Lira)
  • Total costs for 5 weeks in Turkey was 1752 USD (2680 TL)
  • Average cost per paid night was 46,1 USD
  • Visas not required for Thai and Swedish citizens

We spent five nights at a rather expensive hotel in Istanbul which brought up the average cost for accomodation. When staying at small hotels or motels we usually paid around 40-80 TL. We also turned in our bikes for a thorough and expensive service and technical overhaul.

Pie charts Turkey

 

Georgia

  • 1 USD = 1,79 GEL (Georgian Lari)
  • Total cost for 24 days in the country was 944 USD (1690 GEL)
  • Average cost per paid night was 18,5 USD.
  • Visas not required for Thai and Swedish citizens

We stopped longer than planned in Batumi to apply for visa to Azerbaijan and arrange for our chinese visas. On the way between Batumi and Tbilisi Wej fell and hurt her knee which forced us to stay an extra week in Tbilisi to let it heal. All this meant that we spent a lot longer time in cities than we planned and thus got far less camping nights than expected.

Georgia

 

Azerbaijan

  • 1 USD = 0,81 Manat
  • Total cost for our 10 days in the country was 781 USD (632 Manat)
  • Average cost per paid night was 46,6 USD. Most of those nights were spent in Baku waiting for visas and the ferry.
  • The visa fee was 168 USD for both of us together
  • The cost for the ferry tickets across the Caspian Sea to Kazakhstan was 220 USD (110 each) but it is not included in the cost for transportation in pie chart 3 below.

Pie charts Azerbaijan

 

 Kazakhstan

  • 1 USD = 149 TG (Tenge)
  • Total cost for our 9 days in the country was 242 USD (22.700 Tenge)
  • The visa fee was 90 USD for the two of us together
  • Actual cost per night at one of the two nice hotels in Beyneu was 35 USD. There are cheaper options located close to the railway station, but after a week in the dusty and extremely hot desert we were desperate for AC and a proper shower.

Kazakhstan is an expensive country to visit and our greatest cost must have been water in the desert. It would have been interesting to see how much we spent on buying water but now that cost is included in the “cooking” part rather than snacks & drinks, which is mainly coke and tea at the occasional tea houses we visited.

Kazakstan

 

Uzbekistan

  • 1 USD = 2700 Som at black market rates. The official rate was about 1 USD = 2100 Som
  • Total costs for our 27 days in the country was 1040 USD (2.808.000 Som)
  • Average cost per paid night was 22,8 USD
  • The visa fee was 150 USD for the two of us together

Uzbekistan has a weird rule that you have to register with the authorities every third night. This is done by checking in to a licensed hotel or guesthouse. Camping in Uzbekistan is easy and people are friendly and helpful so it wouldn’t have been a problem to camp most of the nights. However, we decided to play it safe and checked in at guesthouses more often than required. Needless to say, nobody checked our registration slips from the guesthouses when we exited the country.

 

Cost distribution Uzbekistan

 

Kyrgyzstan

  • 1 USD = 50 Som
  • Total costs for our 13 days in the country was 494 USD (24.700 Som)
  • Average cost per paid night was 30,6 USD
  • No visa required for Swedish citizens. We think Thai citizens can get a visa on arrival

When we arrived in Osh we had done 50% of the trip and we decided to stay a few extra days at a nice hotel (44 USD/night) to celebrate. When we arrived in Sary Tash we found out that the border to China was going to be closed for 4 consecutive days. We checked in at one of the simple homestays and paid 17 USD/night.  All this meant that we camped far less than planned in this country which is actually ideal for camping since it is sparsely populated and it is easy to find flat areas and water. 

Pie charts Kyrgyzstan

 

China

  • 1 USD = 6,08 Yuan
  • Total costs for 85 days in the country was 4309 USD (26.200 CNY)
  • Average cost per paid night was 23,1 USD
  • Visa fee in Sweden was 179 USD and the extension in Leshan was 59 USD for us together.

Camping in China is easy so it should be possible to get a lot more unpaid nights than we had. We stopped for a week in Chengdu waiting for visa extension, one week in Kunming to wait for better weather and the arrival of my cousin and for 4 days in Hami to do maintenance and planning. Camping is not really an option when staying in big cities and those long stops added to the very low level of camping. Small hotels in the countryside is also very inexpensive and we just couldn’t bother to go pitch the tent when the price for a double room was just 40-50 CNY (7 USD).

After a while in China all the kilometers ridden from Sweden started to take its toll on our bikes and we needed to replace a lot of components as well as tires which can be seen in the third pie chart below.

Pie charts China

 

Laos

  • 1 USD = 7800 Kip
  • Total costs for 2 weeks in Laos was 467 USD (3.412.000 Kip)
  • Average cost per paid night was 11,1 USD
  • Visa fee was 33 USD

We have been to Laos before but couldn’t remember the price level but we thought it would be cheap. Unfortunately we couldn’t be more wrong…. There were plenty of cheap guesthouses along the way, but to buy food at restaurants was unexpectedly expensive. First we thought we were ripped off, but after studying menues and talking to locals (thai and lao languages are very similar) we understood that those high prices were not only for tourists, but for the locals as well. However, most locals seemed to prefer to eat at home in the evenings rather than eating out – I do understand why….

Wej is Thai and since Thai citizens don’t need visas, the cost for visa in the piechart below only reflects the cost for one visa (all other costs are for the two of us).

Pie charts Laos

 

Thailand

  • 1 USD = 31,8 Baht
  • Total costs for 2 weeks in Thailand was 272 USD (11.900 Baht)
  • Average cost per paid night was 13,8 USD
  • Visa fee was 31 USD for 60 days and 56 USD to extend for another 30 days.

When we are in Thailand we are on our home turf and have lots of friends everywhere. We have only stayed a few nights at hotels or guesthouses and that has only been for logistical reasons (to not arrive too early). We stayed with my former host family 65 km NW of Bangkok for a week before doing the final ride into Bangkok.

Thailand has good food everywhere and there is absolutely no need to cook on your own which can be seen on our costs for food. Since Wej is a citizen of Thailand the cost for visa below only reflects my visa cost. Our plan is to stay for a while after finishing this journey so I applied for a 60 day entry visa (1000 Baht) and recently extended it with another 30 (1800 Baht) which makes the total visa cost per day throughout the visa’s validity 31 Baht or roughly 1 USD.

Pie charts Thailand

 

 

Edit March 7, 2016.

If you have read this far, then you are probably very interested in the costs for cycle touring. I then recommend you to check out the cost breakdowns of the “wandering wheels”.

Edit August 4, 2016

Daves Travel pages has an interesting article about the costs of bicycle touring. The article is about the costs of a trip between Greece and England.

 

25 thoughts on “Costs for cycling from Sweden to Thailand

  1. Kalle

    Inte för att jag planerar att cykla som ni gjort, men det är kul med statistik i alla fall! 22 USD per dag alltså. Hur lågt hade ni kunnat gå om ni verkligen pressat det? Inga restauranger, bara guesthouse när det var absolut nödvändigt. Några kläm till på tandkrämstuben etc? Testa på vägen hem!

    En annan reflektion är att det är billigare att ta flyget än att cykla till Thailand!

    Ha det bra, Kalle

    1. admin Post author

      Att flyga till Thailand tar 10 timmar och brukar kosta runt 8.500 kr / person

      Att cykla till Thailand tar c:a 10 månader och kostade 83.000 för två personer.

      Slutsats: Det är bara 5 gånger dyrare att cykla, men tar 10 gånger längre tid. Snacka om att cykeln ger mer “bang for the buck”….. 🙂

  2. Mamma we

    Nu hade jag skrivit ett långt inlägg om hur bra ni är,men det förmår jag inte göra en gång till. Det försvann från min skärm i alla fall. Kul att få napp på bloggen igen. Puss o kram!

    1. admin Post author

      Trist när saker försvinner ut i cyberrymden sådär. Håller på och skriver en slutsummering så håll ögonen på bloggen ett tag till 🙂

  3. dan claesson

    Hej! Nu har jag läst igenom statistiken. Kan bara säga att det är glasklart och intressant. Den eller de som vill veta något om att resa med cykeln oavsett varthän kan med denna information lätt lägga upp en budget.

    Ha det gott så länge!
    Med vänlig hälsning
    Dan

  4. Caspar Höjer

    Hi,

    A few years ago I biked to Italy and then back to Stockholm and loved it. The trip that you describe here is really close to one I have been thinking about doing for awhile. Considering that cost is always such a big part of planning, it is really great to see it broken down here so well, thanks. If I was to do this trip I would most likely do it on my own so I just had a few question. How do you think traveling alone would affect the cost ? How did you feel safety wise on the trip, do you think it would be safe to do alone? Having taken the trip would you have changed the route at all?

    Thanks again for good info!

    Caspar

    1. admin Post author

      Hi,
      Sorry for the delayed reply to your comment. We have been busy returning home and setting up our apartment again.
      Regarding the costs for traveling alone. The only cost in our summary above which might be different for someone traveling alone is the cost for accommodation. A double room is a double room and if you can’t find anyone to share it with, then you have to pay the full price on your own. Of course this does not apply when you stay in a dormitory at a hostel. It is easy to camp in China, but when in a city you have to stay in a hotel with a license to host foreigners and those can be expensive. In smaller towns you can almost always count on finding a cheap room in a lousy hotel for less than 100 CNY and those usually don’t bother with licenses – they just want the quick buck.
      Regarding safety – we never felt insecure. People were nice to us all the way and the only thing that concerned us was road safety. We felt most safe on the roads in Uzbekistan and least safe on small roads in Poland and Georgia.
      If we would do this journey again we would skip the part in western China along the northern Taklamakan desert. It is far from being as nice as beautiful as in Kazakstan and Uzbekistan and there are more towns and cities so it doesn’t feel as adventurous as it did in Kazakstan and western Uzbekistan. We would also have taken a more western route through central China (south of Xining). And of course, we would have gone through Iran, but that wasn’t possible during the summer of 2013 due to the presidential elections.

      Good luck with your planning 🙂

    2. Snezana

      I am a woman and have been cycling for over two yers and a half by my own. And never had any problem. 95% of time I camp and cook on my primus. I’ve lived with 5 euros per day when I didn’t have enough money, but also spent 25 euros in some countries when I earned money. I wanna say, you can spend how much you have 🙂
      The world is more safe place than we usually think. And more cheep for living.

      Good luck!

      1. admin Post author

        Snezana – thanks for checking our blog 🙂 You are spot on in your comment that you can only spend as much money as you have….
        We could have traveled for much less money. In our case we were fortunate to have some savings, but of course it is possible to live on 5 Euros per day (excluding visa costs I assume… ) We like camping but whenever we found a hotel for 5-10 Euros per night we couldn’t simply bother to pitch our tent which have meant that our spendings was a bit high.

        And the world is a pretty safe place. People are generally friendly.

        Ride on… 🙂

  5. Tony

    What an amazingly detailed piece of analysis. Thanks for taking the trouble to do this and post it. We aren’t planning on anything like this ourselves but the principle hold for any trip so it’s really useful.

    1. admin Post author

      Hi Tony
      Thanks for reading.
      I guess a backpacker would get similar costs. They will probably spend more on “activities” and “transports” but less on maintenance and spare parts.

  6. Leon Steber

    It’s great to see that you’ve taken the time and effort to produce these spending charts, it’s going to be really useful for people planning a similar trip. And kudos for explaining your type of budget and what sort of spending philosophy you had. I’ve not seen a cost breakdown like this before and wish I’d taken similar notes.
    I’ve not had a chance to read through your blog but with a quick browse it looks like you’ve had an amazing journey, it’d be a dream of mine to one day do something similar from Europe to Australia.
    Cheers
    Leon

  7. Kristian

    Hej! Jag är just nu på väg från Sverige till Singapore på cykel, än så länge bara i central Turkiet. Av en tillfällighet hittade jag er utmärkt informativa blog när jag googlade runt kring Taklamakan inatt. Finns det något sätt att komma i kontakt med dig Joakim? (Du har ju min mail nu i och med denna kommentar, så tacksam om du skriver en rad.)

    Stort grattis till er lyckade resa och till all matnyttig info.

    PS. Jag har planerat för samma väg som er till Bangkok, med undantag för att jag cyklar genom Iran och gör en avstickare genom Tajikistan längs Pamir hwy.

    1. admin Post author

      Hej
      Låter som om du är ute på en härlig resa och kul att du hittat vår blogg. Mejlar dig privat i morgon.

      Njut av din resa 🙂

      /Joakim

  8. Jess

    Hi,

    Amazing journey guys! And thank you for posting the very helpful monetary breakdown. Really interesting and useful.

    I am currently on a cycle trip from UK to Singapore and my planned route from Istanbul to Bangkok seems identical to yours. I would really value any advice or tips you can give, especially about applying for visas and also anything particular that you would recommend visiting along the way. Am I right in thinking that you got your Kazakstan and Uzbekistan visas in Baku? Where did you get your Chinese visa? Any recommendations for tour companies for visa applications? Many thanks for your help.

    Apologies for posting this on your website but I couldn’t find an email address to contact you on.

    Best wishes,

    Jess

    1. admin Post author

      Hi Jess,
      Nice that you found our blog. I will soon send you a mail with answers to your question to the e-mail address you provided when you wrote this comment.

      /Joakim

  9. Vera

    Hello!

    Thank you for this super informative post. Me and my boyfriend are planning a year long trip to from the Netherlands to Asia and back again and your cost breakdown with detailed explanation is a great help in planning the financial side.
    All the best on your future (bicycle) adventures!

    Best, Vera

    1. admin Post author

      Hi,
      Sounds like you are planning a great trip. I´m happy you found our cost breakdown useful. I remember before we started our trip how hard it was to find info about costs and that was why we decided to make this presentation in order to help others.

      We don´t have any concrete plans for future trips yet. Our plan is to soon start to make a plan… 😉

      Will you blog during your trip?

      Have a safe and wonderful journey.

      /Joakim

      1. Vera

        Hi Joakim, thanks!

        Yes, this is our blog: http://www.oufti.nl. We are now very close to our leaving date, only 4 more weeks until we hit the road. I just wrote a blog post about the budget part of the preparation and made a mention of your blog. Thanks for the link to the other blog you recently added, will check it out too.

        Enjoy the summer and the making of plans 😉

        Cheers, Vera

        1. admin Post author

          Hi
          I am glad you found our post about the costs useful. It would be great to afterwards see if your actual costs matched ours.

          I signed up on your mail list to follow your blog. Looking forward to the reading.

          I can see that you plan to ride the Pamir highway in Tajikistan. We did that in 2011 (before the long trip) and I do recommend you to take the Bartang Valley instead of the actual Pamir Highway. It runs parallell to the highway and starts in Rushan and ends on the M41 (Pamir highway) just south of lake Karakul. That valley is definitely beyond the beaten track. When we got out on the Pamir highway after passing that valley we felt that the fun was over….. We made a video about the, week in Bartang valley

          If you are interested in more details about the Bartang, just make a note here and I´ll e-mail you back.

          And yes – once you´ve started to travel by bike you can´t stop. Last summer we made a short trip to Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh. Wonderful places too and sadly recently plagued by new military fighting.

          We wish you all the best for your coming adventure.

          Cheers
          /Joakim

  10. Pierre Julien

    HI Joakim,
    I’m Pierre, French canadian from Quebec City. Nice to visit your blog and found very interesting informations. Can you show me how did you build your spread sheet to complilate your travel expenses by countries and categories?

    1. admin Post author

      Hi
      I´m happy you found this blog post informative. I´m also sorry for the delay in responding to your question.
      We kept two separate excel files for our follow up. The first file contained all our spendings. We made one row for each day and one column for every cost type (accomodation, food etc). Every row (day) then had a number of entries depending of what kind of spendings we had had. We put in all the spending in local currency and afterwards calculated an average exchange rate. When exiting one country we could quickly get a summary of all our spendings per cost category in that country.

      The other file contained travel our data which also was a spreadsheet with one line per day where we entered start and end points, average speed, gained altitude etc. Besides that we also made a note of where we slept, if it was a paid or unpaid accomodation and what kind of accomodation it was (hostel, hotel, invited, camping). This info was needed for calculating average costs for accomodation.
      When we wrote this cost summary blog post we simply put together all the information and made pie charts in excel. We then took a screenshot of the pie charts for every visited country and uploaded them to the blog.
      I´m not sure if my explanation is clear enough. If not, you are more than welcome to contact me. I could even mail you a copy of our template files.

      Cheers
      /Joakim

Leave a Reply