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 are going to France for a week in August. Ferries plus eurocamp style accommodation is £2k and we’ll probably spend about £2k while there on food, alcohol and activities. Cheaper than an all inclusive hotel type holiday which tends to be minimum £1k per person and we’re 5.

This is wildly depend on how you have your holiday.

Staying in more modest accommodation and cooking everything in house will be far cheaper, same for doing or low cost activities instead of hitting water parks, amusement parks etc.

A week in the Canary Islands in April/May (not Easter hols) has cost us around £2.5k for flights, air BnB, car hire and spending money for 2 adults and 2 under 5s for the last 3 years flying from Gatwick.

Did a little tour of France and Belgium staying in hostels and think spent around £25 a night average for a private room. Caught the Eurostar there quite cheap. Think £100 to Lille and then local trains to get to other towns. Food prices comparable to eating out in London. So can be as expensive or cheap as you like.

Cabin €1400 to €2000
Flight £750 for 4
Car hire £500
Food when there £2000
Looking at northern Italy need more money for trips like Gardaland and boat on lake garda
Probably stay longer and cost more
This is a large cabin between 2and 3 bed not even considering the cheaper cabins as some space and air con is essential.

@JulietteHasAGun when was this?

Last year. Currently planning a trip to Georgia which I appreciate isn’t Western Europe which I’m hoping will be even cheaper. I’ll find cheap flights, catch trains and buses where possible when there. I’m happy with cheap accommodation as long as it’s safe and moderately clean.

We’ve done eurocamps in Europe for summer holidays for around £1000-1500 for a cabin and flights or ferry. Accommodation is basic but when the weathers good you can sit outside. You can self cater which makes it cheaper too

I know it can be as cheap or expensive as you want, that’s why I was being generally nosey at how much people spend. Like I said, I’m not asking about once there - we will spend a lot on days out sometimes - but just the cost of a package. I know booking direct is cheaper as that’s what we’ve always done esp with so many camping and caravan holidays over the years.

Sardinia from mainland Europe for 2 weeks €4000 for 2 people. Overnight ferry alone with car & cabin is just under €1000, the rest is house rental and food.

A week in Tenerife about £1400 for 3 people . That is flights/accommodation. Will spend another £1000 or so on food/drinks.

I usually Airbnb, about £80 a night, and last few times we’ve gone flights have been about £60 each. That’s £620. This is for me and 1 dc. Overall costs would be higher for more people, but accommodation would be better value probably.

I mostly self cater, so I do a normal supermarket shop, so I don’t really cost this in because it’s what I’d spend keeping us alive at home. Usually eat out maybe once a day, but not every day. A few coffees though because I love coffee on the continent so much more than home. And a few ice creams/ice lollies or visits to the market for fruit. I’d say an extra £60 a day on food. +£420

We do a lot of free stuff when travelling. Picnics in parks and playgrounds, free museums or attractions, beach, etc but we might do tickets to a few things, so maybe another £100.

£1100-1200 for a week? We don’t tend to go for a week though, more often 4-5 days, so I say I spend £700-800 on a holiday.

We do eurocamp, £1200 with flights, car hire, insurance, airport parking. £550 spending money.

Our daughter isn’t at school yet though, dreading school holiday prices.

We did a week in Italy, half board, in a lovely hotel for £4k in August a couple of years ago. Two adults, two teens. Spending on top was about £100/day.

Back to camping now for a while whilst we save up again.

I'm dubious about some of the ferry prices quoted. A Portsmouth crossing one day either side of May half term (ie when most children need to be in school) cost us £1100. Perhaps other routes are significantly cheaper. Eurocamp style accomodation is then about £500. That more than triples in August.

We have travelled on the Portsmouth crossings many times as we like the convenience of arriving further west if we are going to the coast. They are very much more expensive than the Dover to Calais or even Newhaven to Dieppe ferries - we've paid over £1000 before when we've taken a large trailer. We have Dover to Calais booked for a car and four passengers in the summer holidays this year for less than £150 each way. We booked non-transferable tickets back in January.

Depends if you're going to St Malo or Caen- there's quite a price difference. A return from Portsmouth to Caen with a small van in the second half of August was coming in at about £500 (early bird) a few weeks ago. But you have to look for the cheaper days, some crossings are much more expensive than others.

Also, some of us would never aspire to "Eurocamp style accommodation". Campings Municipale all the way!

As we are now old, we go outside of school holidays.

AI, I still expect it to be £1000pp.

Of course, if you are flying, you are paying per seat on the plane, so if there are 6 of you it will be massively different from if there are 2 of you. However, if you are driving across to France, the difference will be less.
Same with if you hire a gite and self cater, or if you go to a Eurocamp type place then it is obviously going to be very different from if you like fancy hotels, or, like us, now go to All Inclusive places.

If you then spend all your time lying in the sun, your costs are going to be cheaper than if you are paying to go into Tourist attractions, or places such as water parks.

I do home exchange and my cost per week of holiday (just me as I travel solo) is about £350 on average. That cost includes flights, airport parking, car hire and annual fees for the home exchange site and also the Housesitters site for people to look after cats while I’m away. I usually go abroad 4 times a year. A fortnight in spring then autumn plus two separate weeks start and end of summer.

I’m just generally interested in how much people spend. I very naively thought that £2000 was a huge amount for a week abroad - we spent that last year on an all inclusive holiday for two people and I really thought we’d spent way above the average

If you went in the school holidays it was probably average and not even 'way above average' if you went in term time.

We don't do AI because I don't want to pay for the type of AI that I'd actually like (hate crowded places and buffets for dinner) so we usually self cater or go B&B in an aparthotel, eat out once a day, eat breakfast in the accommodation and stock up with drinks, snacks and easy food for lunch (or dinner if we've had lunch out). That probably costs around £1500 or so for a week but that's in June or September and I always look for cheap flights, slightly cheaper accommodation, use discount codes etc, we also generally don't eat much or choose expensive options like cocktails.

Who were the two people and what type of AI was it? If you're two adults and you went to a nice hotel in the school holidays, that's a really good deal.

However if it was you and a 3 YO going to a slightly shabby nuggets and chips place in Benidorm in term time, you probably did pay way above average.

So your 'piece of string' is longer than some but not by any stretch the longest of all the strings.

What are you hoping to achieve? There isn't a whole load of people out there enjoying AI holidays in the summer for significantly less than £1k pp per week because thats what they cost.

My partner has 2 weeks in August off due to shutdown. I've just been looking at eurotunnel and ferry prices to take our van over to France and was astounded by the price. Admittedly the last trip over we did was 2023 but it was nearly £600 by tunnel with the dog.

The quick answer to this is to search the TUI website. The prices there are the prices people pay! Although you are quite late booking for the school summer hols so some of the good deals will have gone. If you can hold your nerve you’d probably be better now waiting for last minute deals.

Generally speaking an AI package holiday in school summer hols will be around 1k pp and kids aren’t really any cheaper. The “free child place” deals already effectively have a child priced in, they’re not stupid.

I’ve noticed most of your answers are from intrepid ferry users like myself - we get it cheaper because we won’t pay AI prices and/or try to avoid the personal hell that is AI buffets (shudders) - but for this you have to be willing to do all the planning yourself and book things individually and also for it to take a reasonable amount of time and effort to actually get to your destination. If you want a “booked it, packed it” type package deal then anything less than 1k pp will either need to be booked very early/late to get a bargain deal, or will be v questionable food etc.

An odd way to phrase the question. I’ve never heard anyone from uk say Western Europe before. Are you from the uk? If so then be more specific about area!

The cost of flights need to be included. When I was booking our holiday the flights for 3 (two parents and teen) were nearly the cost of the accommodation.

Portugal: 10 days, ryanair and simple self-catering flat was about 2000 k for us 3 in early july. Dd has summer holidays then.

Three years we did the same in majorca for slightly cheaper. We would love to go back, but it is much more expensive now.

Going back 10 years ago. Dd was obviously under 2, but we had a similar hotel in mainland spain for £500!