Europe on $10 a day
At present it may seem an absolute impossibility, yet in 1978 travelling through Europe on $10 a day was quite manageable. For intercity travel, I had a 2-month unlimited pass (Eurail) on all Continental trains within Western Europe (‘Western’ in the Cold War context.) Hence, the $10 per day was towards accommodation, food, local transport, entrance to sights and other miscellaneous expenses.
In places with stronger currencies, such as, the Scandinavian countries, Switzerland and others, occasionally going over the budget was a necessity. Here my nylon tent came in quite handy to save on accommodation. Also through friends I had free-stay in the Netherlands and Vienna. As an interesting side anecdote, between Stockholm and Helsinki the Eurail pass also allowed travel on a sealiner. The ship departed from each city at 5 PM and reached the other at 8 AM the following morning. It offered a lavish smorgasbord at an affordable price, shower, swimming pool and sauna facilities plus spaciously reclining seats for sleeping. The boat became my nightly accommodation while alternatingly daily between these two cities.
On the other hand, Spain was comfortably affordable. It was still recovering from the economic ills of its Francoist legacy and I was able to survive on $6 per day.
Hence, at the end it did average to “Europe on $10 a Day” as the title of a then bestseller on travel suggested.
The journey commenced in London. As UK was beyond the periphery of the Eurail pass, I hitchhiked to Dover and ferried my way to Calais. Then onwards it was the Eurail pass.
The countries I travelled through were United Kingdom, France, Spain, Switzerland, Austria, Germany, Netherlands, Denmark, Sweden and Finland. I decided to skip Italy as they had just discovered the corpse of their Prime Minister Aldo Moro in the trunk of a car. The police and the army, in their pursuit of the Red Brigade members and sympathisers, were randomly harassing, interrogating and arresting many young travellers.
In a way it was not a vacation but an autodidactic journey. It was my first visit to Europe’s greatest museums and art galleries. I saw my first Tosca (which was also my first opera) at the Wiener Staatsoper and followed the entire Schubert Festival season at the Wiener Musikverein with maestro Karl Bohm.
There were also many thrills. It was a creepily exciting feeling on the lonely deck of the midnight boat from Denmark to Sweden when through the fog I saw the blurry silhouette of Hamlet’s castle when sailing past Elsinore. I could practically imagine the king’s ghost on the roof of the fortress uttering, “Doom'd for a certain term to walk the night…” The other exciting memory is jumping from a sauna into the coldest lake imaginable in northern Finland and repeating the process several times. Yes, and nightly skinny-dipping in the Mediterranean after evening after evening of binge drinking and partying in Sitges, Spain.
Now follows the pictorial essay of Europe on $10 a day.
