The thread about Independent vs Organized touring caused me to start thinking about the economics of my tours. My wife kept careful records of our 2008 tour in the Finger Lakes region of New York. There were four of us. We camped each night. We shared the driving of a single vehicle to carry our stuff. All of our expenses went into "The Purple Book", even the lunches we ate in restaurants. As a result we have the total cost for every expense for the week.

Camping (eight nights): $220.75
Car ($0.50/mile for 560 miles): $280.00
Restaurant Meals (3): $141.70
Food and wine: $513.00
Total: $1155.45

Notes: We made campground reservations in advance. That hurt because Reserve America hits you for $9.00 for each separate campground reservation. Also some of the campgrounds required a two night minimum even though we only stayed one. Food and wine includes all meals, snacks, wine (with each dinner) other than the ones we ate in restaurants. It also includes gas canisters for our two burner Coleman stove. The restaurant meals also include two peach pies we carried away from the delightful Flour Petal Cafe in Geneva, NY. The trip was nine days and eight nights. $288.86 per person, or $36.11 per day, per person (calling it eight days).

Somehow I remembered it as more, but the Purple Book doesn't lie. $36.11 per person per day is pretty cheap. It was also quite plush. Our dinners were pretty elaborate. Salad and wine every night. Mostly chicken dishes with rice or pasta, with a fantastic asian spicy beef dish one night. We bought local corn on the cob whenever we found a farm stand. So there was corn on the cob pretty much every night.

I really should write up that tour on CrazyGuy, but in case you're interested the pictures are in a Flikr set.

Anyway, I'm curious. What are your touring economics?

Speedo