Contented-Campers.com

After blowing our budget in July by shopping in preparation for Norway, covering huge distances and French & Norwegian toll roads, we were hoping that a more conservative travel programme would leave us better off in August – I’m very happy to say that has been the case.

The big save has been on groceries. We spent heavily in Germany getting every nook & cranny in the van filled with food and wine. This proved its worth. A 3 litre cask of wine (and very nice too) cost €9 in Germany. The cheapest cask in Norway was around €45. On the downside … only 3 litres left in our stash for September. Apart from ongoing foodstuffs such as bread, biscuits and fruit we’ve spent little on food this month – we still have some frozen food in the deepfreeze, but this will all soon run out. I did make Tom Yum soup last night with fresh prawns …

Diesel has been another area where it’s difficult to squeeze the budget. The typical price is NOK15.50 a litre, or €1.69 or NZD2.78 or £1.45. That’s not cheap. I rather suspect that this is an area that will see continual overruns. It’s funny to say that eating out has been cheap – the prices are so horrific that I simply can’t spend the necessary in order to sit down and have a tiny portion of fish & chips at €18, in a cardboard tray.

Ferries we’ve blown the budget, as expected. The tolls are a problem for the future as we’ve signed up with a toll company and will be billed sometime in the future. We’ll add that in at that point – I think it will be a big number. Laundry is another cost, albeit small, but it’s better than having wet washing draped around the van – and a happy Niki is certainly worth at least double these costs.

All in all … €742 under budget for the month … YYeehaaah!