Originally Posted by Ty0604

$10/day is very doable. I averaged $7/day on my tour this summer. Spanning May 1-August 5. I used WarmShowers, had some friends along the way and camped in various places. Fire stations and churches were a favorite place of mine to camp for free. I stayed in 3 hotels along the way but only paid for one. The other two were paid for by good samaritans.

To this question: How much weight should I be carrying in food?

That depends on a lot. You haven't provided us with enough information to answer it accurately. Where is your tour? Does your route pass by a lot of stores? How much do you eat?

If stores will be common on your route then there's no need to carry much food. If I'm on tour and there's a store every ~30 miles I'll only carry some snacks and not much else. A few times while on tour I went a few days without seeing a store. I carried a few Cup Noodles and a few boxes of granola bars. Otherwise I ate a lot of junk food. Donuts, ice cream and chocolate were some of my favorite foods. Cheap and full of calories. Dairy Queen is my favorite restaurant while on tour.

I can burn a lot of calories and not replace them all and still be fine. This is where how much you eat comes into play. I can burn 6,000 calories a day while only eating 4,000 calories and survive fine. Another person burning 6,000 calories may need to eat 8,000 calories to survive.

Hope this helps a little. You'll need to provide more information before anyone can help you more though! Otherwise your questions are pretty open ended and you'll get a lot of responses like mine.