Travel Expense >

In our last report, we summarised the expenses from our first quarter travelling internationally on this journey.

We began October in Vientiane, the capital city of Laos. This is mid-way in this beautiful country as we made our way from the south to the north. We celebrated Shish’s birthday in her favourite Blue Lagoon at Vang Vieng, a small hippie town two hours north of Vientiane. After that, we drove seven hours through the most beautiful landscapes of the country to reach the cultural city of Luang Prabang. We spent ten lovely days here and experienced Boun Awk Phansa, the lantern festival which marks the end of the Buddhist lent. Later, we took the high speed train from Luang Prabang to Vientiane – our vlog about this experience has garnered a fair bit of attention!

After a couple of days of rest in Vientiane, we flew to the most expensive city in South East Asia, Singapore. When we initially booked our hostels in Singapore, we were stressed about how expensive it was. But my uncle and aunt (who live there) invited us to stay with them and also fed us delicious home-cooked food! After spending two fun days with them, we flew to Cebu in the Philippines.

The Philippines turned out to be a massively fun trip for us! We only got an entry for 14 days (visa-free entry with a valid Singapore visa), so we had to move quickly to see as much as we could. We spent three days in Cebu jumping off canyons, sliding down waterfalls and swimming the legendary sardine run. But nothing compared to diving with those giant whale sharks in Oslob!

After that, we headed to the voodoo island of Siquijor and enjoyed the island life experience. Siquijor is very laid-back and has some beautiful waterfalls and beaches. And four days later, we headed north to the bigger island of Bohol where we eagerly rode a rental scooter to see one of the smallest primates in the world! In Bohol, we spent two days each in Panglao and Anda (a hidden gem) and experienced our first ever Filipino typhoon. It was MAD!

We returned to Cebu city for a couple of days before flying back to Singapore. We did a little bit of sightseeing in the city on a challenge to only see the free stuff!

In early November, we flew out to Yogyakarta, Indonesia and then took an overnight bus to Bali! Our plan was to rest for two weeks while completing overdue videos and then begin exploring Bali. This is where we filmed our first ever Q&A video on travelling full-time.

The rest of November was a combination of fun and chill. We visited a LOT of places in Bali and even sailed to the neighbouring Nusa islands. We liked the vibe of Bali and ended up extending our visa for another month and came up with a plan of visiting all the remaining SE Asian countries! Meanwhile, in mid-December our Youtube Channel got monetised!

After a fun Christmas with friends in Ubud and an early NYE party in a hostel in Kuta, we finally bid goodbye to Bali to reach Kupang, a city in the East Nusa Tenggara region of Indonesia to ring in the new year!

EXPENSE

In this quarter, we visited four different countries – Laos, Singapore, the Philippines and Indonesia. This is what our expenses looked like: 

✈️ Flights: $915 / INR 74,094

In this quarter, we took four international flights and one very long domestic flight:

• Vientiane (Laos) to Singapore – Fly Scoot
• Singapore to Cebu City (The Philippines) – Fly Scoot
• Cebu City (The Philippines) to Singapore – Cebu Pacific
• Singapore to Yogyakarta (Indonesia) – Fly Scoot
• Bali (Indonesia) to Kupang (Indonesia) – Lion Air

⛺️ Stay: $514 / INR 41,606

We stayed in budget hotels, homestays and hostels in nearly all places except for a resort in Anda, the Philippines (collab) and in Karma Ubud in Bali (family membership). We also stayed with an uncle and aunt in Singapore which helped with our budget. These are the places we stayed in:

• Laos (Vientiane, Vang Vieng, Luang Prabang)
• Singapore
• Philippines (Moalboal, Oslob, Siquijor, Panglao, Anda and Cebu City)
• Indonesia (Ubud, Canggu, Kuta, Nusa Lembongan, Nusa Penida, Amed, Sidemen)

🏝️ Sightseeing: $201 / INR 16,256

Lots of activities this quarter, but the cost was lower than the previous months.

• Laos: tickets to the lagoons and temples
• Singapore: none – we only went to the free sights
• Philippines: guides and tickets to snorkelling sites, waterfalls and museums
• Indonesia: tickets to waterfalls, temples and other activities. We also attended a wedding (so we included our gift to the couple here)

🍕 Food: $700 / INR 56,737

Breakfast (sometimes), lunch, snacks and dinner; includes water too. We did spend more money at Indian restaurants because we just wanted home-style food and Indian food is not always cheap in foreign countries.

🚌 Transport: $495 / INR 40,125

Rides on the local city bus, tuktuks, interstate buses and ferries, a bullet train in Laos. We also rented scooters in Laos and the Philippines on many days, and in Indonesia for a month.

🔖 Visa: $278 / INR 22,555

Permission to stay in the foreign countries:

• Singapore visa for 30 days: $22 (INR 3,608)
• The Philippines granted us a visa-free entry based on our Singapore tourist visa 
• Indonesia visa on arrival for 30 days: $35 or IDR 1,000,000 (INR 5,263)
• Indonesia tourist visa extension for another 30 days (via agent): IDR 1,600,000 (INR 8,421)
• Timor Leste visa application authorisation letter – although the country offers visa on arrival, the official immigration website stated that the border officials ask for an application authorisation letter. Although this letter is issued freely at the Timor Leste consulate, we were asked to pay a fee of IDR 1,000,000 (INR 5,263)

💊 Others: $157 / INR 12,688

Misc. items like SIM cards, photocopies, soap, laundry, medicines, gifts and more. Of this we spent about $80 on new clothes as some of our old ones were no longer fitting well. Shish also got a new piercing which cost us $20.

Total: $3,260 / INR 264,061

For 93 days of travel from 1-Oct-22 to 31-Dec-22, we spent USD 35 per day (INR 2,839) or USD 17.5 per person, per day (INR 1,419).

How much has it cost since we left home?

This totalled up to INR 584,853 or USD 7,285 for ~233 days of travel for two. Across these days the average cost of travel came to INR 2,510 or USD 31 per day for both persons together.

That works out to INR 1,255 or USD 15.5 per day, per person. Thats our current cost of travelling full time (in India and South East Asia).

Or maybe a little more of Shish’s expenses as against mine – she likes to shop and hide it in the “others” category. 😛

INCOME

In the fourth quarter of 2022 (our third quarter on this trip), we earned a total of INR 2,597 / USD 32.07.

English channel

• Subscribers: Increased from 2,430 subscribers (as on September 30) to 3,060 subscribers (as on December 31).
• Views: 40 new travel vlogs every alternate day. In total, we have 110 videos on the channel and 178k views.
• Earnings: INR 1,191 / USD 14.71

Kannada channel

• Subscribers: Increased from 50 subscribers (as on September 30) to 404 subscribers (as on December 31).
• Views: 40 new travel vlogs every alternate day. In total, we have 47 videos on the channel and 16k views.
• Earnings: INR 0 / USD 0

Travel Blog

• Views: 37k page views
• Earnings: INR 1,406 / USD 17.36

NET INCOME/EXPENSE

With the new income and considering the above expenses, we are at -INR 582,256 (-USD 3,993). To bring this into the greenzone as soon as possible, you can support us here:

Do you have any suggestions or want us to add more details on this report? Let us know in comments below.

Useful links

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