How to Make a Cheap Vacation Expensive.
Posted: September 16th, 2008 | Author: Joe | Filed under: spending | Tags: Frugal, Saving, Vacation | 1 Comment »
My family and I take a vacation every year to the Adirondacks. We go camping. I find it to be very relaxing since I get to unplug from the television, cell phone, computers and all the other electronic devices of the modern world that seem to be increasingly screaming for my attention. It’s not always the picture of relaxation of course. This year, for instance, we had torrential rain on a number of days. But I digress…
While taking a walk around the campsite it occurred to me how many people tend to take something that is inherently simple and cheap, and make it expensive. In a word, they accessorize their way to expense.
For the most part, we go camping with only what our cars will hold. Don’t think that we rough it. Far from it. In fact, we bring coolers of adult beverages, books, enough food to choke several horses… well, you get the idea – we bring a lot of stuff. And some of our members have motor boats for water skiing and tubing, but nothing too ostentatious and usually well-used by the time of purchase.
We sleep in tents and shield ourselves from the rain with tarps suspended over the picnic tables found on each camp site. Some people would say anything without room service is roughing it, while others feel that if you can’t carry it to the mountain top in your hiking pack it isn’t needed. I think we probably fall somewhere in the middle of the spectrum.
But it’s easily one of the cheapest vacations available. We “get away from it all,” while still being able to relax and unwind. The sites themselves cost only $20 a night to reserve, and we split that amount by each family camping. So to reserve the sites for a week and pay for food, drinks and gas is less than $500 per family. It’s hard to imagine a family vacation for less money that’s consistently relaxing and fun. It isn’t for everyone, but it suits us perfectly.
Still, there are people who can take the simple, frugal vacation and spend their way to an expensive one. As I walked from the campsite to the bathrooms one day, I was observing just how many people camp in $60,000 motor homes towing $40,000 motor boats! I hope these people spend most of their summer camping on lakes and then move south for the winter to camp some more, but I have a feeling it just isn’t so. Many of them appear to be quite less than retirement age. In fact, some of our neighbors had just such a camping and boating rig and they admitted they go camping only 3 weeks out of the year. They are probably 20 years from retirement, and work most of the rest of the year.
I wonder how much of that is working for their “stuff” instead of putting their money to work for them buying appreciating assets and building wealth.
I think I’ll stick with the $500 vacation for now. 
How about you? Does your vacation work for you, or do you work for your vacation?
I’ve been reading along for a while now. I just wanted to drop you a comment to say keep up the good work.