Three years ago, when I decided to drive back to Africa, my only concern was: money. How much does such an expedition with a vehicle cost?
I obviously started to seek the answers needed online. I spent months and months, afterwork until 1 am in the morning, all my weekends, and every single minute off I had to get an accurate idea of the budget. And I can tell you: it was not easy. People talk about the adventure but rarely about the budget and costs -which, honestly, I can understand.
You are more and more in here, willing to undertake such an overland trip and asking about the BUDGET. And it’s fair enough. I would have loved to find this essential piece of info years back.
Money is not the absolute happiness but money helps to realise desires and dreams, along with courage, discipline, organisation, passion, and resilience. Let’s be very honest.
Anyway, I finally could find information about world tours -backpacking though- budget. I decided to take it as a base and opted for 15,000EUR per year (shipping, fuel, accommodation, food, medical, border crossings, health insurance, activities, and other fees) and = 1,250EUR per month.
My budget for the first twelve months (26/01/2022 to 26/01/2023) was 16,020EUR (indeed, I had to ship Rafiki from Europe to Cape Town + to pay for a flight ticket).
My initial goal was to overland between two and three years (if I could lower the budget to 10,000EUR per year on year 2 and 3).
Before the expedition, I didn’t take into account the tiredness of such an adventure and that sleeping on such a thin mattress would hurt my back. I sometimes slept in lodges which also explains the final budget.
Today, I don’t have this issue anymore with the new setup on Rafiki (which is available to check out on my Patreon account since 1,5 months).
Anyway, I will detail more about this budget matter in a second post next week.
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