How much does it cost you to go to Western Europe for one week?

[NCTDN]

I’ve deliberately posted here and not on holidays to get a more general view. I know there’s huge differences between people and I think I’m way off the mark in the cost of a week abroad in somewhere like Spain or France. Someone at work told me how much it was for her family and I nearly fell over!
I’m not here to ask as a competition, but genuinely intrigued. We had a caravan for many years and toured all over Europe with the children. Ferries then were cheap as were campsites. We’ve also been fortunate to have use of a family apartment so only had to pay for flights.
Neither of those are an option for us now so I’m looking at what is the average cost for an average week. Nothing fancy, just a week abroad. So all I’m after is the cost for one week and for how many people. Thanks!

We're doing a European city break for 2 adults and 2 children for a week in August for £2400. Adding in spending money (we're in self-catering accommodation) I expect it'll be around £3000 all in, possibly a bit more.

Most of my colleagues with children spend £6-8k for a week in an all-inclusive hotel and justify it by saying you can't get a holiday abroad for less, but you absolutely can!

I'm planning interailing with two children across Belgium and the Netherlands and Germany and Poland.
Not sure how many days in each but around two weeks in total and my budget is around 1500

I'm planning interailing with two children from Belgium to the Netherlands to Germany to Poland and my budget is around 1500.

If there are only two adults then you can do it very cheaply. Budget airline to the Costas or Nice (cabin bags only), self catering accommodation in an apt or cheap hotel £80 a night - you can make/have your own breakfasts and pack a lunch and drinks. Eating out £50 a day if you don’t want anything too fancy (we like a French creperie and tapas in some parts of Spain is cheap). Maybe an extra £20 a day for snacks and drinks. About £700 each for a week all in. You could do it even cheaper than this if you’re happy with a cheaper room with no air con or shared pool and no restaurant meals.

This is an impossible question to answer! Tent or 5 star hotel? City, beach or countryside? Plane, train or car? Time of year?
Personally, we go as 2 adults for city breaks in good hotels, eat in nice restaurants etc, so it's probably a bit "top endy". But that's our choice. Even then, it depends on location..... we'll be going to Austria and Slovakia in September, but a hotel room in Vienna is nearly twice the price of one in Bratislava.

10 days in France for 3 last August cost me €4500, which almost half of was the ferry (I miss the cheap UK/France crossings!). We had a eurocamp van and a private room in a youth hostel. Teenagers are expensive beasts. DH and I are away in June for 5 nights 5 star AI for about £3000, but thats UK school holidays which makes it cheaper. Your holiday last year was very reasonable.

I haven't been to an AI hotel, but £2k sounds very cheap to me. I'd expect to pay at least £3k just for B&B in a hotel, so flights and other meals extra. But, obviously, it depends on the hotel and location.

I’m paying £1200 for 4 nights self catering apartment in Austrian alps. Comes with free public transport and activity cards so hoping minimal spend on doing activities.

I generally aim for about £700 per person for accomodation and flights for a week and then a bit of spending money. But we usually go to places where you can find very reasonable restaurants and bars etc, and eat in the apartment some of the time. We don't generally stay in hotels as if we can wrangle it we like a room each.

Last summer, DH and I had a week in Tuscany.

Self catering villa with a 10m pool (my absolute condition is a proper pool to do laps in, 10m is minimum length I'll accept! ).

It was 90mins from Rome which were cheapest flights on BA.

With flights and then two massive supermarket shops, we spent about £5.5k.

Villa was £3k, flights and hire car £1k+ and then eating out and food shops and petrol for the rest.

We didn't do anything 'on the cheap'.

I pay around £4k for 2 weeks accommodation in S of France every year - it’s a large villa with a pool and 5 mins walk to the beach. Tunnel, tolls and petrol probably add another £1500, plus we spend a lot on nice food from the supermarket- probably another £500. Couple of meals out - another £500. So around £6.5k in total for 6 of us - children are all adult age now so they eat and drink similar to us.

Paying just under £900pp just after the schools go back in Sept. That’s a package, self catering with flight seats selected. Have paid more like £1200-1300 the last few years but with more included.

@Gardeningsideeffects Why on earth are you spending £1000 on a hire car in Italy for a week???

@StabiaGirl it was BA flights, plus hire car. Plus flight arrived an hour late and hire car company said we had to be there at the time or we lost the car. Total scam. I used a broker to book it. Never again.

So we had to pay another £350 to rebook with Avis. I know. It was horrible.

@NCTDN sorry mis-quote.

Cheaper option for a family would be take car over to France by ferry or Eurotunnel then drive to somewhere like the Loire valley in a day or do an overnight in a motel and drive down to the south of France, maybe Dordogne or right down to the Riviera. The last might be best with two nights stopover on the way but you can overnight in some nice places along the way and make it part of the trip. Then get a self catering property from Airbnb or an owners website, can often get somewhere nice for less than £1k for the week.

It can be as cheap or expensive as you like.

Are you confined to set dates, as last minute may be cheaper. Look at hotukdeals.

Also can get a cruise from sub £400 ppl AI.

A week in 4star hotel in Tenerife (B&b) is £2500 in August for 2 adults and a teen. When I was looking (jet2 & TUI) there were much cheaper options. We usually go AI to turkey but last year was too hot and we usually pay about 3-3.5k for a 4/5 star hotel.

Our flights to Italy for 4 adults cost about 800 and our apartment in Lake garda is 1500. We could have got accommodation for quite a bit less but went for the pricier option for a great location. No meals included and goodness know how much we will spend.

I'm bound by school holidays until I retire, so family holidays are always twice as much for us as for my friends.

When dc were younger, AI or Sc on a geek island or Spain was probably up to £3000, when all was added in.

Last year SC probably worked out nearer 5 all in, because 2 teenagers eat more than adults and we did more expensive trips.

This year, b&b, is currently just under 2500 for flights and hotel, but I'm allowing for another 2000 once we get there.

Approximately £1500 - £2k for 2 adults staying for a week in Spain depending on the month you go. That is staying in 2 bedroom villa but eating out for every meal.

We normally pay around £2K for two adults half board with Jet2 - Malta for example. So I imagine in school holidays for a family it’s £3 to £4K.

It’s costing us £4600 for two rooms (we have teens) in a five star hotel in Tenerife. That is bed and breakfast and include flights. However, we are going at the beginning of July as it’s GCSE year for one of my DC and the other has longer holidays because they attend a private school. It’s more expensive in the state school holidays.

We spent 2 days in Athens and 7 days in Crete bed and breakfast in 5 star hotels, with car hire in Crete for £3,000 last week, plus £1,000 travel insurance (DH’s medical conditions). Generally, we ate out at local restaurants in the evenings. It was €30 each to go in the big archaeological sites, we went to see.

Usually do Eurocamp-style holidays in France. Don’t usually book through Eurocamp as they can be pricey, find the site you want then book direct.
18 nights in August for family of 4 with teens is around £2300 including overnight ferries this year. Add on another £300 for fuel and extra for spends, we’ll probably spend around £5k in total. it’s still the most affordable holiday. Some years we’ll add a big ticket trip in (eg a day or two at a theme park) we tend to eat out for lunch rather than evening meals (that’s just habit from years of holidays with small children) and we do have simple tastes as for other ‘entertainment’ - a good beach with interesting rock pools will keep us busy for days, add in a pretty town, maybe a harbour, coastal walks, etc and we’re set.