Travels and Curiosities
 

Motivate Mondays is our free weekly email subscription created to feed you tasty bits of travel savings trends and inspiration.
 

Monday is time to Motivate!

July 13, 2020

Camping for Money-Saving

One of our biggest motivators for starting this blog was our love for travel. But, unfortunately, traveling can get pricey really quick.

It can be downright stressful at times, especially if you don’t have the money set aside first. No one wants to run out of money mid-trip, but, unfortunately, it’s a common problem.

And then all of a sudden, what’s supposed to be a fun and relaxing vacation morphs into one of anxiety-filled dread as we turn to credit cards to pay for the things we forgot to budget for like meals, happy hours, excursions, museums or other entrance fees and even lodging.

But we have an easy solution for this, and that’s camping.

 

Besides this $14 bottle of sparkling wine, we spent $22 on a one-night campsite at Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park in June of 2019. Apart from money spent on gas, the collective $36 is all we spent for the day as we brought our own food from home. Admittedly, we may have over-spent on the wine. 🤭

Photo by Elaine Skylar Neal / Travels and Curiosities
 

Camping is a lifestyle choice, and it’s not for everyone, but it’s a travel decision that can save you hundreds if not thousands of dollars over the course of an entire year.

Here’s just one example of camping’s impact. Let’s say you’re visiting Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado during peak tourist season. You’ll easily pay $150 per night for accommodations in nearby Estes Park for just two people. Over a three-night weekend, that’s $450 minimum that you’ve just spent. And unless you’re staying in a backcountry cabin with no running water, that’s a seriously conservative estimate.

And camping doesn’t have to be reserved for lessening the cost of road trips. You can even incorporate camping into your next far off travel destination.

If you’re an REI member, you can rent camping gear for essentially the cost of a one-night’s stay at a hotel. Chances are, you’ll have a better view while camping too. REI has at least one location in all but 11 states in the US. You can reserve your gear online and simply pick it up at the store. They don’t ship rental gear though. If you want your gear shipped, Arrive Outdoors will ship rental gear anywhere in the contiguous US, and the return shipping costs are included in your order.
 

Two of our camping tents glow from lantern light at dusk during a recent overnight at Buffalo Creek Campground near Pine, Colorado.

Photo by Elaine Skylar Neal / Travels and Curiosities
 

We’ve clearly fallen in love with camping. And it’s not because we’re a couple of Colorado hippies averse to showering. 😉 Far from it! In this time of COVID-19 reduced travel and financial uncertainty, it just seems like the wise approach for both limiting our interactions with other people but also saving our ever-important dollars. Not to mention, it’s just great to spend more time out in nature.

We adore camping so much that we’ve just launched an entire CAMP + GLAMP section on our blog devoted to inspirations around this popular American past time.

One of my personal favorites is an article we published last week on 15 Amazing Destinations for your Camping Bucket List, which is a curated list of some spectacularly beautiful places across the world that are worth knowing about even if you never want to camp for the rest of your life.

We hope this email has sparked some travel savings inspiration!

To explore recent email topics, visit our Motivate Mondays Archive.

Stay safe and happy exploring,

Vincent and Elaine

Founders, Travels and Curiosities
 

Know anyone who might benefit from this weekly email? Share the link below! And thanks for being part of our community!

www.travelsandcuriosities.com/motivate-mondays
 

Please follow us on our social channels for more curious and unique travel inspirations from around the world.

INSTAGRAM https://www.instagram.com/travacurio/

TWITTER https://twitter.com/travacurio

PINTEREST https://www.pinterest.com/travacurio/

FACEBOOK https://www.facebook.com/travacurio/
 

This email may contain affiliate links. If you decide to purchase through these links, we may receive a small percentage of the sale at no additional cost to you. You can read more about our affiliate partnerships on our policy page.