How We Spent One All-Inclusive Budget on 31 Nights Abroad

The Curiosity That Prompted the Challenge

When people ask how much an all-inclusive holiday costs, the answer is usually framed as convenience versus price. But value depends entirely on what you prioritise — unlimited meals in one location, or multiple experiences spread across a year.

At the time of writing, a 14-night, four-star all-inclusive holiday to Cyprus for two adults in late June 2026 costs £4,582.34. That price includes flights, hotel, food and drink, luggage, basic seat selection, an inland-facing balcony room, and coach transfers to and from the airport.

It’s a perfectly reasonable cost for a traditional summer break. For many people, it’s exactly what they want — one place, everything organised, nothing to think about.

But when we saw that figure, it made us stop and think.

Because £4,582.34 isn’t just a holiday. It’s a budget. And we found ourselves wondering what might happen if we took that same kind of budget and allocated it differently. Not better. Not more luxurious. Just differently.

Could we stretch not just the budget, but the experience?

During 2025, we travelled for a total of 31 nights across four countries, tracking every penny we spent. At the time, we weren’t trying to prove anything. We just travelled in the way we naturally do. Independently, sometimes carefully budgeted, sometimes a little more relaxed, but always intentionally. Once the year was over, we sat down with a notebook and a calculator one Sunday afternoon, and we started adding everything up.

And when I say everything, I mean everything.

Airport drinks. Car rental. Petrol to get to and from UK airports. Cocktails. Supermarket shops. Souk purchases. Even a 90 pence bus fare in Morocco. If we were going to compare properly, we were going to do it honestly.

The 31 Nights

Over the course of the year, our budget covered:

• 7 nights in Cyprus

• 3 nights in Rabat, Morocco

• 7 nights road-tripping through France, including canoeing in the Dordogne

• 6 nights in Corfu, Greece

• 8 nights in and around Agadir in the Souss-Massa region

Thirty-one nights in total, five separate trips., four countries.

There were no gifted stays or influencer-style perks. Apart from using some Tesco Clubcard vouchers to reduce the cost of a little airport parking, there were no points-funded flights or hotel rooms. It was just structured, strategic spending, and a willingness to move around rather than settle in one place.

What It Actually Meant

Numbers tell one story. They show what something costs. But they don’t show what it feels like.

They don’t capture the small details that linger long after the receipts have been filed away. And that’s really what we were buying with our money. Not just nights away, but experiences, feelings, immersion.

Spreading our budget across five trips meant five separate arrivals. Five moments of stepping off a plane or out of a car and feeling that subtle shift. The change in air temperature, the smells, the sounds. The moments you truly remember.

In France, it was lowering the canoe into the Dordogne and pushing off into slow-moving water while birds of prey circled high above us. Limestone cliffs rose on either side of us and herons stood perfectly still at the edge of the bank, waiting for the faintest ripple.

At one point, we pulled onto a quiet stretch of shore and just sat there, eating our packed lunches, listening to nothing but the flow of the water and the gentle breeze. No schedule. No expectations. Just space. In that moment, there was a real feeling of freedom, and a sense of being exactly where you’re meant to be.

In Morocco, the contrast couldn’t have been greater. One morning we found ourselves ushered into a tiny spice stall and handed a glass of sweet mint tea. Before we’d quite worked out what was happening, the stallholder began scooping dramatic quantities of ras el hanout, paprika and harissa into plastic bags, clearly hoping to make a day’s takings in one transaction.

We exchanged glances, half-amused and half-anxious, as the pile grew larger. Thankfully, after some smiling negotiation, the stallholder tipped some of the spices back in to their containers and we left lighter in spices (and in the wallet) and heavier in stories.

In Corfu, it was climbing the old fortress one evening with the breeze pushing against us at the top, the sea stretching out in shades of blue below, watching the cruise ships depart after their day in port. Later, it was sitting on a harbourside as fishing boats knocked gently against the quay and sipping on cocktails as the sun went down.

In Cyprus, it was something simpler — standing in a supermarket aisle debating which local wine to try, then eating dinner barefoot on a balcony as the evening air cooled and the sky turned shades of pink and orange behind the neighbouring Greek Orthodox church.

Nothing about these trips was extravagant, but all of it felt vivid.

The Total

When we added everything up, our total spend for all five trips came to £4,753.03.

The all-inclusive benchmark we were comparing against was £4,582.34. In other words, we spent £170.69 more than the cost of a single two-week package holiday.

But that additional £170.69 covered car rental, sightseeing and entry tickets, petrol for driving to and from UK airports, a full French road trip, activities, souvenirs — and, most significantly, seventeen extra nights abroad.

Broken down per night, the all-inclusive works out at roughly £327 per night. Our 31 nights across four countries came in at approximately £153 per night.

Less than half per night. More than double the time away.

It’s also worth saying that this wasn’t a like-for-like comparison in terms of dining style. Much of our travel was self-catered (particularly in Cyprus, where we didn’t eat out at all) although on the other trips we enjoyed meals out, coffees, and the occasional cocktail.

We weren’t dining in restaurants three times a day, as you would effectively be doing on an all-inclusive package. That’s part of what makes all-inclusive holidays good value in fairness. If your priority is eating out for every meal without thinking about cost, they can make a lot of sense. For us, though, we’re happy to balance supermarket meals with the occasional restaurant experience. It’s just a different allocation of the same overall budget.

A Different Way of Looking at It

This isn’t about proving that one style of holiday is superior to another. For some people, two weeks in one place with no cooking, no planning and no moving around is exactly what they need. There’s comfort in unpacking once, and settling into a predictable rhythm of pool, buffet and evening entertainment.

For us, though, movement is energising. We like changing scenery. Different menus. Different languages. Different rhythms. I’m the one who craves it most; my husband is steadier by nature, but over time we’ve found a rhythm that works for both of us. We move enough to feel inspired, but not so much that it becomes exhausting.

Financially, the difference was £170.69.

But what that bought us was seventeen additional mornings waking up somewhere unfamiliar. Seventeen additional evenings under different skies. Seventeen more chances to feel that shift in perspective that travel brings.

We’re often asked how we afford to travel as much as we do. The honest answer isn’t that we’re wealthy. It’s that we allocate differently.

Sometimes the same budget can create a completely different shape to the year.

And perhaps the more interesting question isn’t “How much does that cost?” but “What could that budget do, if I structured it differently?”

Not everyone will want to travel this way, and that's absolutely fine.

But for us, it works.

And that, ultimately, is the point.