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hello we are mic in Tarek LM from Libya
and I'm calm and we are gone to Europe
for seven weeks
we just recently paid off our house and
we are completely debt-free so we
decided to celebrate and pay for a
seven-week trip to Europe with cash and
I'm not that much cash compared not that
much cash so we were able to do it for
about $500 a person per week which is
actually really good if you go with the
travel agency usually it's like 2500
dollars up to 5000 per person per week
so I think 500 bucks person is pretty
good so we're gonna give you some of the
tips that we used to do our seven week
trip and we planned it all ourselves
he planned most of it himself I mean I
kind of helped with the dates but you
were the real details were Jeff right
okay so I'm gonna tell how we started
and he's gonna get details so we had got
the brilliant idea last year that we
would like to go to Ireland this summer
and spend the summer there because we
thought we were gonna pay our house off
last year we didn't get it paid off as
soon as we thought we would well this
last May we unexpectedly were able to
pay off our house and we were like wait
a minute we can still go over to Ireland
if we want okay
well so then I talked to my daughter and
I said how long do you think we should
stay she said mom no more than three
four weeks three four weeks tops no more
than four weeks so we're like okay so
then Mike and I sit down we're okay
where do you want to go so what we don't
want to rush so it gives going out and
out to where it's seven weeks now and
how we started was well and we partly
the reason why is because we wanted to
be more restful yeah and if you jam too
much into it most people plan way too
much and if you cut it in half you're
still doing too much exactly yeah we
wanted to rest during this vacation we
wanted to be an actual vacation
Americans don't know what vacations are
vacations are we actually go rest
not where you go kill yourself running
all over creation so we started the last
week of April right I think it was the
first week of May er the last week of
April and we decided to go the end of
June
now we guys as calendar June July and
August and there was one particular
place where Mike and Ellie went that
they really really liked so we wanted to
get in there first so that's kind of
where we started was looking at that
place we looked at their schedule to see
when they were available
yeah the other thing really quickly you
know normally we would schedule it in an
offseason but at this time we didn't
have that luxury and let's gonna wait
till next year
yeah but when we looked at the prices
they were actually not very much more
than the off season no and what happened
was I said well let's just go ahead and
go it makes like oh there's no way we
can afford that I said well let's just
look so he looked it up and he's like oh
well wait a minute tickets are only 750
and her dollars wait a minute we can't
do this in seven weeks and so that's
kind of how we started this whole thing
now let's start with tickets first just
so we can say what's the best place well
so first of all we looked at that one
place the farm the Ellie and I stayed on
that we wanted to say and then we kind
of said we could spend some time here we
spend some time here and then at some
point we tried to determine how long was
that we were going to want to be and so
then we normally we would buy the
airline tickets at that point and then
fill in the middle but this time we
think we didn't do that yeah yeah we had
a slight catastrophe in scheduling but
what did you want me to say what I do as
far as especially now that well let's
let's talk about the airlines we're kind
of talking about that real quick our
favorite place to look is just fly calm
Tuesday after 7 p.m. mountain time we
find the best deals and consistently the
prices will be lower on Tuesday
afternoon there's not sponse mr time we
just discovered this alia our daughter
and I went on a father-daughter only
trip a couple years ago and
and at that time we just did a lot of
research to see what are the best ways
to get the best prices and that was one
of the things you just got it's just fly
it's brilliant it just looks at all
these airlines and gives you all sorts
of options yeah and so that's what we
use to get our plane tickets for about
$800 per person so then if we done it in
April that would have been about 580
dollars per person yeah because we went
in summer and we kind of had to with
school and all that so then we got our
calendar and we found the places that we
thought we wanted to go well as we
started looking the places that we
thought we wanted to go the price is
triple or quadrupled in the summer and
we're like there's no way we're spending
$400 a night this place is nice but it's
not that nice and so that kind of threw
us off a little bit when we couldn't go
where we want it right away right and we
later discovered with Airbnb the price
that you see there is not necessarily
the price the time of year you put the
date in and exactly how many people
before and then click whatever the
confirm button is before it will
actually show you the past now and we
didn't know that till we had planned so
we had happened planned the entire trip
and then we went to go buy our Airbnb
reservation and the prices doubled
tripled quadrupled and we were like what
we were totally shocked so we had sat
there and spent two days planning where
we were gonna go on all these places
only to have the prices change and then
we were like okay this is not worth $400
a night this is not worth $200 a night
and we got most of our Airbnb s for $100
a night and so what we did was we found
the places that we wanted to go the most
and looked up those houses and got the
exact right price yeah and then got the
right price and so then we took our
calendars and rode out okay we have this
house for this week so now what are we
going to do the week before are we gonna
go to Scotland Ireland so and we
actually do this more than once we
printed calendar pages for the wee
three and we kind of filled in what we
could and we said okay so what are we
gonna do with these four days and we
don't have a plan for and trying to
figure out how to get from one place to
the other because we were partly going
on when there they were available as
Airbnb yeah so most of our Airbnb places
we're staying at are a hundred to one
hundred twenty-five dollars a night
because most of them are for a week so
most places will give you a discount for
a week it is for the entire house the
entire house family five or six yeah and
that includes a washer and a kitchen and
everything so we'll be able to do
laundry and all of that now
then after we kind of set up our
calendars Mike went in and did his
spreadsheet so go ahead and telling
about your spreadsheet well I usually
make a spreadsheet and I do variety of
things with it I say usually this is
only the second time I've done it this
way but I try to put it in a way where
you can see all the days and have okay
we're here from this date of this day
and then we're from this date of this
day we're here and that way try to
connect everything so that you don't
miss anything in the middle like oh wait
we're going from here to here how are we
getting there or we've scheduled
ourselves to be here and then here but
we don't have a day in there to be able
to go to this other place to get to the
second place so the spreadsheet is
really helpful because I can lay it out
and look at it and see how everything
connects but also I use a spreadsheet to
identify what things we have booked
already mm-hmm and what things are still
remaining to be booked and I kind of
sometimes like color code but put a
highlighter on there if something needs
attention still yeah and we used Airbnb
for all of the places that we're staying
you can get a link in the description
below but and I don't know if it's an
affiliate link or not we'll see they
they used to have a referral program and
if they do hey please use it so we can
go on another trip but we ended up using
Airbnb and I will say it wasn't real
easy to plan this so I'm not gonna say
that it's easy it's not like just making
a phone call to the travel agent and
saying do all this it did take us
probably 40 to 50 hours worth of work
to plan it all out but it's kind of cool
because it's it's fun process as long as
you're looking at the right prices yeah
there's a fun process
and you can pick places that are very
customized to your interests like we
really like more rural things like like
Ireland we'd like the rural part of
Ireland the old-fashioned the kind of
Irish culture part of Ireland more than
the cities lures and touristy things and
so we were able to look and find oh
here's a sheep farm or here's a here's a
working farm there's no dairy when Ellie
and I went on her father-daughter trip
we were like we've said oh this place
looks like a mansion and and just there
are all different kinds of specialty
things you can find through that and
it's kind of fun just looking at that
and choosing so the time that you spend
is part of they just saying what would
we find is the most fun thing yeah and
so it's not like it's all a chore yeah
and I will say at one point in the trip
we had it all figured out and everything
and then this one particular place that
we really really wanted to stay when we
went to go book it it was like three
times the amount and we were like okay
forget it
this is just too much work we're not
going to do it forget it forget it
forget it
so we went to bed that night the next
morning I woke up and I thought okay we
can't get this particular part but
there's got to be something else in
Scotland so I started looking and I
emailed Mike a couple of things I said
okay I know we can't do this one but why
don't we try this one so you're gonna
have frustration when you're doing a
huge project like this but it's worth it
because I mean we've saved thousands and
thousands of dollars by planning it
ourselves and spending you know
basically a week's worth of work to save
thousands and thousands of dollars so
well and the other thing is the well at
what point was it we when Ellie and I
went we kind of said let's go from this
state to this day and then fill in the
blanks in the middle with whatever we
want to do this time we kind of picked
some Airbnb s that based on the
schedules they had because we had a lot
less time before I was going to get here
and then we said okay now that we sort
of have a loose layout here let's go
ahead and book the flight from this day
to this day and then other things in
between those we can fill in yeah and it
was really not hard to do yeah so we
found their babies that were open plan
those out make sure we could get a plane
we got the plane first then we went
right in to all the big long stays first
and we did all the week and two weeks
days first on Airbnb then we went in and
filled in with the little space so we
had like three days here in London and
we had like two days in Dublin and then
another three days in London that we had
to go back so that's kind of the order
that we did it in we are using we're
renting a car and one big tip for saving
money for is if you can drive a standard
it is a lot cheaper it's four or five
times as much in Ireland yes he driving
automatic so how much is was an
automatic in Ireland oh I can't remember
this time when Ellie and I went for two
weeks it was $125 for a standard or $600
from automatic so that's a huge savings
so if you're okay with driving on the
wrong side of the road if you're
American um if you feel like you can do
that and automatic is way more expensive
so if you can drive a standard that'll
save you a lot of money also there's a
thing on the insurance called collision
damage waiver which causes the cost of
the rental to be much much higher where
you're basically paying for an
all-inclusive insurance but if you have
or get a car if you either have or get a
credit card that covers that you can put
that on that card and then they will pay
up to some large amount of money if you
damage the car yeah and so that's
something that we've looked at both
times yeah so - so the credit card is
our extra insurance for Americans
driving you know
the road and then we're using so we're
gonna have six people at some points in
our trip and our car only holds five
people so a couple of people are gonna
couple of our family is going to take
the train to the same destination to the
same destination and that's one way
we're going to save it's cheaper for us
to spend the $40 or $60 a ticket for the
train than it is to spend a couple
hundred dollars more for bigger car I
know we can get a bigger car well I
didn't see my student speaker well
unless we get one of those giant bands
but the thing is and we don't really
want to do that but the other thing is
to consider I don't know about all the
places in England it's not gonna be as
much of a problem in Ireland a lot of
the roads are really small yeah and I
would get the smallest car we can fit
everybody yeah then we're taking a plane
to Norway and so we built that so we
figured out the big things then we
bookended it with the flight from home
to London and from London back home and
then we were filling in with smaller
things
and then things like Norway we said okay
now within the time that we have is take
a little commuter plane from London to
Norway and back and then so those were
inside of this this kind of plan we
already had and there's one thing I
wanted to say when you said Dublin
before I forget we're not really into
the big touristy stuff and Dublin was
fun when Ellie and I were there for just
one afternoon but Dublin is frightfully
expensive to stay there and so one of
things we did to save is we booked a
place about 45 minutes outside of town
in a nice a really nice little area so
that if we want we can go into Dublin
for a whole day and then come back to
there but instead of spending three
hundred and fifty dollars a night to
stay in Dublin that's why I say it's
frightfully expensive we were able to
spend something like $80 $90 a night
because we're 45 minutes away yeah so
one of the next tips is the bigger
cities London Dublin Glasgow you know
all those try and stay outside of the
city because everybody wants to be in
the city so it's 2 to 3 times higher and
if you can get outside just a little bit
especially for Americans we drive
everywhere so it's not a big deal for us
but some buses like London it's good to
be within in the range of where the the
- yeah London Underground the subway
because you can get everywhere in there
without having to have a car at all so
we kind of look for places that aren't
right in the middle of everything but
there right at the tube station where
you can just walk down and get on the
tube and you can be there for a minute
so we're flying over we are gonna use
the tube and walk when we're in London
then we're gonna rent a car and go to
the English countryside out further
towards York for about ten days or so
then we're going to go up to Scotland in
a rental car and then from Scotland
we're gonna go to Ireland and we're
going how are you getting tired is it
going we're flying from Scotland to
Ireland and don't assume that one way
it's cheaper because we can do sail rail
to get from Dublin to London and it's
cheaper than flying but from going from
Glasgow Scotland to Dublin it's like $50
to fly yeah and so it's and that's the
full flight plan like if you have just a
computer bag it's $35 - so then we're
renting a car in Ireland for two weeks
in Ireland and then we're gonna go and
fly back to London from Ireland we're
taking a real bag yeah we can I heard
about that but it might just be fun and
it was but that's where you ride a ferry
and then some trains yeah and then we're
gonna fly over to Norway but here's a
little thing it's three hundred dollars
for us to get our big suitcases to
Norway so we rented a storage locker
they have four little copters where we
can stack our suitcases in there it's 50
bucks instead of 300 so we're gonna put
our suitcases in there now
okay so we rented a storage locker in
London because we're going to be in
London the renewed
and come back to London before we go
home yeah so we thought instead of
spending three hundred dollars to haul
all the luggage to Norway that we don't
necessarily need all of that for that
one week that we would leave the
majority of it in the storage locker in
London yeah for 450 dollars instead of
300 yeah and here's one tip guys that
nobody I have not heard anybody say but
book when you are arriving in a foreign
country
book your Airbnb for the night before
you arrive because something we didn't
plan for and we really messed up on was
we arrived at 7 o'clock in the morning
and we can't get into our Airbnb until
3:00 in the afternoon we're gonna be
dead tired we're gonna have what eight
hours or so where we have our suitcases
that were having to haul all over
creation and so book we should have
booked our Airbnb the night before and
of course we did call and see if she
happened to have it open she didn't but
but she did tell us we could put our
luggage in there yeah here then we can
get in so that'll be helped yeah so
that'll help a little bit but that's a
little tip there to kind of save your
sanity on it but that's kind of the gist
of how we did it
500 bucks person per week that's really
pretty good and that's including all the
food airfare all of our sale rail or car
rentals and just shop around and look
for the best deals on a dime well and
also we said just fly for the flights
real easy is great in the UK for trains
Irish Rail in Ireland is great for
trains they're not very expensive what
else is one other thing
oh the one thing when we were talking
about the scheduling you want to make
sure to rethink over and over again and
write it down and that's why I put in
this spreadsheet so you can say how do
we get from this place to this place and
then from this place to this place in
this place to this place because there
are things where we think oh we didn't
think how are we gonna get from from
Glasgow to Dublin we have to figure out
that flight but just the other day one
of the Airbnb guys said
Hey what time is your flight from
Gatwick come in which is an airport out
on the edge of London and I thought oh
yeah we'll just coming to Gatwick and
then we'll get the tube and go into town
well I discovered it's past the tube
line we can't ride the subway there and
I didn't realize this till he said that
so that's another thing I thought whoa
we have to figure out how are we gonna
get from that Airport to the Arizona
take a bus yeah and so just trying to
connect the dots so that you don't miss
any major from here to here and then
start with the big stuff and then work
in with the little stuff and you should
be good that's how kind of how we did it
people have been asking I'm asking so we
thought we'd give you a brief overview
and if you have any questions please
leave them in the comments below and we
will try to answer them please like
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dieting on a dime cookbook because well
that's what we sell so but it's also the
strategies we used together it is which
is why we're able to do this really this
is how we keep our grocery bill around
three to four hundred dollars for for
six people a month because we keep it
low so then we can do these funds
because we'd rather not spend the money
on eating out all the time
could spend the money on actually we had
a really nice trip eating out in London
alright guys we will see you guys next
time bye
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you