More Hints & Tips ffor Backpackers...

Remember this is a blog & it updates backwards! Go to the bottom and find the first post if you want to get the gist of this in sequence...

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The strange thing about Backpacking for me was this...no one commented on my age!

I felt at first that the young kids wouldn't want a senior person in their rooms with them, but no one ever said anything.

In fact when everyone got asking each others reason for being on the go, I said I was on my Granny Gap Year & they all thought it was awesome that I would do that...but thought I must have been awfully young to be a gran.

One thing I forgot to mention about hostels was the fact most all have lockers &/or secure areas for your goodies. I took my big laptop & simply locked it up in the lockers allocated to my bed number, applied my padlock & went on my way exploring without worries.

Breakfast is provided in most hostels from around 6am to about 10 am, depending on areas, so have a good one to keep the hungries away. Cereal, milk, bread (or toast in UK only),  jams, tea & coffeee in most hostels in UK.

In Europe most hostels provided a variety of Rolls, cheeses, meats, fruit, yoghurt, breads, jams, meusli, cereals, milk tea, coffee & hot chocolate for breakfast & most people seemed to make a few extra sandwiches to take with them to have for lunch..

I found European hostels breakfasts to be of a generally higher standard in most instances.

As far as standards of cleanliness etc, I found most were great, some were 5 star standard, a couple could have had some bath room access renovations, but overall...very good for the 6 pounds to 25 Euro a night paid. 

There were a few glaring exceptions who sparkled & glimmered with new & clean as clean...The Huttledorf in Vienna, YMCA Hostel in Munich, one in Salzburg & the one in Galway Bay, in Ireland, for instance. The one in Galway Bay was 2 yrs old, called Snoozles & I thought was probably the best hostel overall. 

Most had kitchens with appliances, crockery & cutlery, so a cuppa & food were never an issue. Supermarkets were handy & plentiful & food was cheap. Booze & chocolate were so cheap in Prague & Vienna & chocolate  & yogurt were practically at give away prices in Switzerland.

In Prague a half litre of beer was 6 cz...that's about 5-6 cents to a cz, making a 500 ml bottle of beer 36 cents. 

Vodka was about $3-4 Aussie dollars a big bottle & my favourite little 200 ml Piccolo bottles of champers were (85cents Euro) about $1.20 or so. Here they are from $4-$5 a 200 ml bottle.

Forgot to mention the bus fare from Galway, Ireland to Dublin (right across the country) was $5 Euro! Missed the $1 Euro fare by a day, but got the 5E fare just the day before, so do take heed and check out the fares daily for specials. The 10Euros I saved allowed me the super feast I had in Bangkok on the way home...the Kamikaze blue drink & the lovely Thai Green chicken curry!

If on the pension, let Centrelink know you will be away & when you will be returning. There is no problem & they keep sending your pension to your designated account.

If you are between houses & want to save some money, go to Europe & UK & spend up to 6 months in cheap hostels with limited travel. Here's an example.

Hostel $10 Ausd a night...$70 Ausd a week. 

Food. $50 a week will see you well fed.

Local transport...$10 a week.

$10-$20 a week for extras. No electricity, papers, petrol etc.

All up...about $140 -150 a week whilst saving.

So in 6 months you could save about $150- $200 a week, that's about$3,000 to $5,000 in that period of time & using your 2 advances a year of $1,000 each 6 months, you could go overseas once a year, save heaps, trip around for one full month with your savings....or just trip around for the whole six months & don't save!

Free WiFi, so you can sit & use your lap top all day for FREE...Write & publish a book. Just look at the opportunities for your grans & gramps everybody!