But I actually didn’t expect to properly fall in love with its amber peddling, quiet majesty and old town charm.
With an exceptional array of places to eat, drink and be merry, Gdańsk is now officially my go to recommendation to all in search of a short and cheap (emphasis on the latter) European break.
So what are you waiting for? Get on Skyscanner and find that flight!
So as well as general cat sitting, we also got out and about to enjoy the many sights of Paris!
Paris often splits opinion but my top tip would be to choose an area and really get to know it. In the past, this has been around Montmartre (still my favourite area) but this year we really enjoyed moseying around Le Marais – lots of cool shops and coffee stations – WHEN THEY’RE BLOODY OPEN. (Note, a lot of Paris go on holiday during August).
James had never visited Disney in any capacity before so we decided to pop along. We just wish it wasn’t on the day after a rather messy night out… Rollercoaster rides and tequila regret DO NOT GO WELL.
Since our cat sit was free, this trip cost a mere £50 – the price of our eurostar there and back. It also ticked off one of my ‘5 days or more’ stipulations. Get in.
With 3 holidays left to go, there’s £576.82 left in the kitty.
Felt more than a bit lucky with this one – but it’s a pretty simple trick for getting free accommodation in not just Paris, but many cities across the globe!!
Airbnb is bloody great but when you’re trying to get a bargain, you don’t have winter sales and promo codes to help you get the price down – or do you?
What many people don’t realise is that whilst Tara has stated that her flat in Knightsbridge is £290 a night, she – as an Airbnb host – has an option to send potential stayees (yes that’s a real word) a ‘special offer’.
I.E. IT’S TIME TO GET YOUR HAGGLE HAT AND YOUR BARTERING BROGUES ON LADS
Before we get into this, if you haven’t signed up for Airbnb yet make sure you do so with a referral link as you’ll get money off your first stay. Here’s mine if you want to use it!
You could give this a go in any situation, but here are the two scenarios where bartering can be particularly successful:
You’re staying a decent amount of time – there’s a lot of work that comes with checking people in and out so if you’re looking for a place for a week or more, owners will be much more open to having you stay rather than 7 different people across 7 different nights
They haven’t filled their room/home and time is running out – this is riskier as it could mean you’re left without, yet you could always book a back up hotel room with a great cancellation policy so that you’ve got something to fall back on
I decided to go with the latter whilst plotting a UK break for holiday number six after realising just how bloody pricey staying in the homeland can be.
Here’s what I did:
STEP ONE – Compile
One week before, I searched for available rooms and homes in a whole host of places within a 2 hour train ride of London – notably Oxford, Brighton and Margate.
I created a new ‘wish list’ and popped them all in – this is a great tool as it automatically updates what’s available.
I found 40 places in total.
STEP TWO – Wait
Whilst checking and then seeing the place you were secretly lusting for get booked up is THE PITS, it’s worth checking in a couple of times over the next 4 or 5 days to see how things are shaping up.
STEP THREE – Pounce
Two days before you intend to go away should be a good point to put some feelers out there.
When I clicked back on, I saw that just 10 places were still available – I said it was risky, didn’t I?! – and the next step was to schmooooooze.
Done in the form of a ‘oh me? I’m just super casual this is helping you more/oh god please house me’ message:
Hi XXX,
Your place looks absolutely beautiful!
My boyfriend and I both work in radio in London and after a rather hectic week at work (and we’re only three days in!), we’ve decided to try and get out of the city, get some of that sea air and hit ‘refresh’.
Our plan would be to explore the area and sample whatever delights the local restaurants and bars have to offer!
Our budget for staying 2 nights is £XX including Airbnb’s service fee which I understand is under what you’re currently looking for, but if you’re wanting to fill your place with respectful guests who you wouldn’t see much of – then look no further!
I look forward to hearing from you.
Chelsea
STEP FOUR – Wait again…
All my messages got a reply (thank you, kind Airbnb brethren).
8 said they were actually booked but they hadn’t updated their calendar (bahhh)
1 said ‘can you check back in tomorrow?’
and 1 said ‘yeah sure!’
GREAT SUCCESS.
So how much did we save?
My bartering meant that we were able to get a super cute room (with its own bathroom and living room) in Margate down from £105 to £80. Not too bad?
It’s worth saying that the ‘can you check back in tomorrow?’ place would have been an entire house in Brighton for £90 down from £180! So there’s definitely some massive deals to be had.
Extra saving
As it’s always me doing the booking around here, this was James’ FIRST EVER BOOKING on Airbnb meaning he had a £30 welcome offer from a friend, bringing our final cost to a mere £25 each.
If you’ve never used Airbnb before, you can also get some moola off by being referred to by a friend.
A jaunt to Dublin wasn’t even on the cards but on St. Patrick’s Day, ferry company Stena Line were holding a FLASH SALE and boy do I love a FLASH SALE.
As I clicked through, my mind was already formulating reasons I needed to go to Dublin.
“I’ve never been before…”
“Guinness is pretty tasty…”
“It’s £4 return! Fuck needing a reason!”
Yet as the slashed price fares flickered before my eyes, I realised that the two ports Stena departed from weren’t exactly close.
Fishguard – 267 miles away.
Holyhead – 287 miles away.
JEEZ LOUISE.
And just as I was about to hit close, sadness welling up in my once eager eyes, the eureka moment hit.
I already had a trip back home to North Wales in the diary, so all I needed was…
“Mum? You know how I’m coming to see you next month, yes? Well, how about we spend two of those days in Dublin?”
“Er, what? Chelsea. I’m just getting my hair done…”
“NOBODY WAITS FOR A FLASH SALE, DONNA”.
I hear her ruffle the pages of her magazine before sighing.
“Oh sod it, go on then”.
Thatta girl, Donna, thatta girl.
Now, even with our less-than-the-cost-of-a-pint crossing, I was still aware that Dublin can be pretty pricey. So, to keep the total down we opted for a private room in a hostel. A room, can I just add, that was listed as a ‘suite’.
Well, brace yourselves to see the worst goddam suite in the existence of the whole bloody world.
After a rather pricey trip to Doobz (what do you mean, no one calls Dubai that?!?), I needed to cash in a trick I was hoping to hold onto for a little while longer…
STAYING WITH A MATE.
And before you say it, it’s not cheating.
Why?
Because I said so.
(IT’S MY HOLIDAY CHALLENGE SO I’M MAKING DA RULEZ).
My mate Line is from Aarhus in Denmark, and we met 9 years ago (9 YEARS AH!!!) when we lived next door to each other when studying in Atlanta.
We always bang on about visiting the other, but we’ve been pretty pants in recent years so, teamed with super cheap weekend flights from Stansted airport, what excuse did I have?
If you’ve got your heart set on Dubai, there’s plenty of one stop options to get you there for less than £230 – I talked about these in my last blog post.
However, if you’re flying direct with a top class airline, there’s a great way to make the most out of your money by using Dubai as a stop off.
Intrigued?
Dubai isn’t called the ‘gateway to the middle east’ for nothing – it’s a key hub for connecting flights, especially when you’re flying from the UK. Therefore, adding in an additional return flight to Sri Lanka, Thailand or India could end up only costing you an additional £69.
For example, here’s the straight forward return from London.
Dubai Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 16th Oct
So, say we wanted to spend 4 nights in Dubai to explore the city, where could we head on to next?
As our chosen airline, Emirates, flies to over 150 destinations, it means that there’s a lot of choice when it comes to adding another trip on. All you have to do is search for a ‘multi-city’ flight, which is made pretty easy by sites like Skyscanner and Kayak.
For example, if we were to add in a flight on Monday 9th October to another destination and then return back to London on Monday 16th October (which automatically would send us via Dubai), this is how much it would cost.
Mumbai, India +£69
Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 9th Oct – Mon 16th Oct
Colombo, Sri Lanka +£88
Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 9th Oct – Mon 16th Oct
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia + £116
Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 9th Oct – Mon 16th OctHong Kong, China +£117
Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 9th Oct – Mon 16th Oct
Ho Chi Minh, Vietnam +£129
Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 9th Oct – Mon 16th Oct
Bali, Indonesia + £142
Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 9th Oct – Mon 16th Oct
Phuket, Thailand +£150
Thurs 5th Oct – Mon 9th Oct – Mon 16th Oct
And these are just a handful of options. The basic rule is ‘does the airline you’re originally flying with go anywhere else?’ If so, get searching for multi-city deals.
It’s important to note that this doesn’t necessarily mean that this would be the cheapest way of getting to that extra destination, but it does give you a great option if you were heading somewhere anyway, or wanting to do 2 destinations in 1.
Now that’s a cracking good question, and one I sought to find out after a friend announced that he’d like to celebrate turning the big 3-0 with a trip to Dubai.
I’m not gonna lie, the place has never been on my wishlist (I mean, I have a degree in Ancient History. I like OLD SHIT, y’know?) but I couldn’t bear the thought of being sat at home and seeing pictures of my mates driving around in gold lambos and getting diamonds encrusted in their incisors (okay, okay so I wasn’t 100% on what went down in Doobz at this point).
“Surely you’re not counting it in your holiday challenge?” many have asked but crikey, if I’ve got to squeeze in 10 trips this year I can hardly take a sly trip to Dubai ‘just for the lols’.
Yet the cost. Good lord and gracious heavens above, that place is expensive.
They have a gold ATM, FGS.
When it came to accommodation, I quickly realised that the housemate and I weren’t going to be able to afford an apartment at the Marriott Hotel and Suites where our mates were staying, so I set out to find somewhere as close as I could.
Fortunately, Dubai is overrun with apartments (I swear twelve blocks went up whilst I was there) so actually, there was a lot of choice and we found a one bedroom place just two buildings down from the Marriott.
I found it on booking.com by using the map search and it came in at a sweet £184 each for 4 nights. (Edit: this apartment is no longer available so I’ve linked something similar!)
It was by no means luxury but it was clean, spacious and in a great location. Though if you like a soft bed, this is not the place for you… GOOD FOR THE BACK THO, INNIT.
It also had a nice pool area and as it was in The Princess Tower, the 2nd tallest building in Dubai, the views from its 102nd floor residents lounge are pretty special (and a hell of a lot cheaper than going up the tallest building in the world, the Burj Khalifa).
As for the flights, they were cheaper than what I was expecting considering we didn’t have any flexibility on our dates.
The flight was… Well, I won’t lie, the flight out was AWFUL but that may have something to do with the 5 gins and 2 proseccos I’d necked before the flight (our mate has a MAGIC BANK CARD that got us into one of the lounges for ZERO PENNIES).
It also didn’t help that Qantas really crammed us in there – we’re talking a Ryanair amount of space here, lads – and I had a classic Chelsea I’m-dehydrated-in-a-small-space meltdown.
However, the flight back (after 0 gins, may I add) was much better. Emirates = more space, better food and better service in general.
I managed to book our flights for £279.83 using BudgetAir via Skyscanner but, as these were booked before I decided to be a holiday-going-heretic, we definitely could have flown for cheaper – I remember seeing one stop flights with Turkish Airlines for a sweet £200.
Here’s a quick example of the kind of prices you can get at the moment, using Thursday 21st Sep – Monday 25th Sep as an example:
London Gatwick – £224
Manchester – £252
London Heathrow – £255
But enough about your potential shenanigans, how are the numbers looking for me?
The total cost of my trip to Dubai was £463.83.
Yes, it’s a lot, but don’t you think it makes this whole thing more interesting/ohmygodwhathaveidoneeahhhhhhhh
*slaps self in face with a wet haddock*
It leaves me with £1,075.45 for the remaining 8 holidays which when you break it down, is £134.43 a pop.
Doable. Right?
Well, until I remember that it needs to include a business class flight…
how many holidays 